Touché
by princespeach
Summary: High school: a roller coaster of hormones, drama, and teen angst. Who says this year's gonna be any different? AU, co-written with Thingbe.
1. Once Upon a Time

**So to start off, this isn't just a crossover of ToS and Naruto. It's a crossover of many, many different things. There will be crossover pairings. **

**Please keep in mind that we'll be using the Canadian school system, and driving is on the left side of the road. Also, we took a day off October and put it in November. This fic takes place in the 2009-2010 school year.**

**Disclaimer: I can't tell you how awesome it feels to say that neither of us own Tales of Symphonia, Naruto, Bleach, Full Metal Alchemist, Fruits Basket, Trauma Center: Under the Knife, Romeo and Juliet, and Death Note.**

* * *

Chapter 1 – Once Upon a Time

"_Life itself is the most wonderful fairy tale." – Hans Christian Anderson_

Lloyd awoke to the sound of an alarm buzzing away in his ear. That was odd. That was very odd. He couldn't remember the last time he actually woke up with the alarm. Could it be that he was finally starting a good habit? He sniffed the air. Bacon… Oh, so that's what got him up. The one thing that did the trick was, of course, food. Scrambling around his large room, he found a clean uniform hanging on the door of his walk-in closet. He wore his usual uniform white dress shirt (complete with school crest), black tie, grey pants, and his own personal touch: red suspenders. Once he was dressed, he headed to the bathroom for a quick clean-up before checking in the mirror to make sure his hair was as impossibly spiked as ever. It usually stayed that way, but on odd occasions (like in the rain, or after a particularly restless night) his hair would fall down over his eyes, making him resemble his father. Creepily so, which was why Lloyd chose to let his hair be spiked. That, and he thought it looked cool. Which, of course, it did.

After this, he followed the smell of food all the way to the kitchen where his father was standing, wearing one of his many suits (he probably had a meeting today). He was finishing off a mug of coffee before heading out to work. Kratos looked up as Lloyd walked into the rarely-used kitchen.

"Good morning," he said in a mildly cold tone. Lloyd was used to that. Neither of the Aurions were what you would call 'morning people'.

"Mhm," Lloyd mumbled, searching the counter in search of the food he _knew_ was there. He found it: a plate full of bacon, eggs, and _oh_, even those little sausages… His mouth watered slightly. "_Food_… Did you make this?" He questioned, though it was unlikely, since neither of them knew the first thing about cooking. Kratos shook his head. Lloyd sighed in annoyance.

"Was it those _girls_ again?" His father had a very annoying habit of attracting vast amounts of gift- (in this case, food-) bearing women to the house. Fangirls… Lloyd shuddered slightly.

"Actually, no. It was the neighbours," he answered, rising from the table. "You're going to be late for school."

"No I'm not!" Lloyd yelled. It helped if he voiced his denial. "I will NOT be late!" He grabbed his school bag, not bothering to check its contents. He caught his father's eye on the way out of the room – he was giving the dreaded parental stare. "W-what? Oh, man, what am I forgetting this time?" He groaned.

"Nothing. Assuming you remembered to study for your chemistry test." Damn him… Well, no point in worrying now. Hell, he probably would've failed it even he _had_ tried to study. With one small cringe at the thought of _school_, he headed out the door, turning for a moment to shout a quick goodbye to his father. Now he began the stupidly long walk down their driveway to the large cast iron gate. Sometimes Lloyd thought his dad made _too_ much money… Although, the gate _did_ keep the fangirls out. Most of the time. Lloyd snapped his head up as he heard a very familiar sound – the sound of a school bus driving away.

"Shit!" He yelled, slamming the gate closed behind him as he began his sprint. It didn't help that the INSANE driver got his kicks from speed. Well, that and fighting with the students… Luckily for him though, after years of experience chasing school buses, Lloyd was pro at catching them, and he managed to grab the door handle as it skidded around a corner. One hand in a death grip around the handle, he bashed against the window to catch the driver's attention. The man looked at him, and, laughing, floored the gas pedal. _That sick bastard…_

"OPEN THE DOOR!" Lloyd yelled, to no effect other than the complete amusement of the driver, and a good number of his fellow students as well. They turned another corner, and Lloyd struggled to hold on. "OPEN THE DOOR!" He repeated. Apparently some of the not laughing students (he suspected Colette) were protesting against this new form of scholastic torture, because the driver stopped laughing to roll his eyes and open the door. "THANK YOU," Lloyd said – make that _yelled_. The driver began to laugh again.

"AHAHA! What's wrong? You held on pretty good! MUCH better than last week!" Lloyd scowled at the insanely muscular man; he remembered the many injuries this maniac had caused him over the years.

"You're crazy!" He yelled in return. As he turned to find a seat, the bus sped up (how fast did these things go?), causing Lloyd to stumble. This, of course, gave the man more reason to laugh.

"AHAHA! So, Lloyd, you good to babysit the girls tonight?" How in the hell he went from torture to babysitting, Lloyd didn't know. What was even more confusing was Lloyd's response.

"Yeah, that's fine."

Sometimes, Lloyd hated his life.

Clinging to the backs of the seats for dear life once the bus started moving again, he looked around. The only empty seat was next to that weird kid at the very back… What was his name? Ulquiorra? Something like that. Lloyd made his way to the seat, trying not to be flung into the ceiling, never mind the floor.

Once he finally got there (it HAD to be at the back), Lloyd flopped down with a huge sigh. Ulquiorra looked startled for a second, then went back to looking out the window.

"Uh… Sorry…" Lloyd mumbled, with no response from the person sitting next to him. He took his backpack off to rest it on his knees, and looked around at the rest of the bus. He saw Zelos talking at Sasuke somewhere near the front, which reminded him to thank Sasuke for the food. No doubt Itachi had made another feast for breakfast and left them with too many leftovers.

The rest of the twenty-minute bus ride was very awkward, at least for Lloyd. He was used to talking, and since he was sitting beside someone who rarely spoke at all, he was left to fidget and look around (and hang on to the back of the seat in front of him, when the bus made an especially sharp turn).

They finally reached the school gates, and the bus changed to driving at a more normal speed. It stopped in front of the school, and the doors opened. Everybody scrambled to get off the death trap as soon as they could, much to the amusement of the driver.

"Have fun at school, kids!" He said to the escaping students, still laughing.

"Screw you, Kenpachi!" Someone yelled from the crowd. This made the driver laugh even more.

Lloyd was (of course) the last off the bus, and he knew from the moment he looked up at the large letters that wrote out 'CENTENNIAL ACADEMY' on the front archway, he was in for a very, very bad day.

* * *

After buying his lunch, Lloyd headed to the table where he and his friends usually sat. Only Ling was there, which was rather unusual. After unceremoniously dropping his food onto the table and sitting down, he mumbled a quick "Hey," and rested his head on his arms.

"You fail your chemistry test?" Ling asked between mouthfuls.

"How did everybody know about it but me?" Lloyd answered, frustrated, after lifting his head back up. "Even my _dad_ knew, and I don't remember complaining to him at all!"

"Well, you might want to start using that agenda they handed out to us at the beginning of the year."

"Bah. I'd just forget where I put it."

"Touché."

At this point, Naruto showed up, instant ramen in hand. After almost tripping on Lloyd's bag, he set himself and his food down, grinning madly. Before the other two could greet him, he shouted, "I totally ACED that math test!"

"How'd you manage _that_?" Ling asked, at the same time that Lloyd mumbled a depressed "Damn you."

"Iruka said that if I didn't do well on this one, he wouldn't buy me any more ramen, so I kind of got Colette to help me over the weekend…"

"You two had a study date?" Lloyd asked, smirking.

"It wasn't a date! It was over the computer!" Naruto half-shouted back, attracting the stares of people around them.

"Right. Hey, where is everyone?" After looking around, Lloyd realized he didn't see any of their other friends in the cafeteria... come to think of it, he hadn't seen them in the halls either.

"Ichigo went home sick, and the grade elevens are on a field trip." The blond answered after downing his ramen. "I think that English teacher's taking them to the zoo or something."

"What does the zoo have to do with English?" Ling asked, somehow already finished his massive pile of food. Naruto shrugged.

"You know Shigure, any excuse to get out of marking papers."

"That sounds like him." They turned in surprise to see Kiba appearing from the mass of students in the cafeteria. After carefully placing his bag on the table, he took a seat next to Ling.

Lloyd eyed the bag, noticing that it seemed to squirm and move of its own accord. "Kiba, did you bring Akamaru to school again?"

"No," he said quickly, revealing a bagged lunch composed of dog treats from his pocket.

Ling reached out and poked the wiggling bag. It barked. Kiba's eyes darted about for a moment before he hung his head and sighed, shoving a handful of treats into the main pocket of the bag. Sounds of munching were heard.

"Fine. But it's not my fault! He gets lonely at home!"

"Don't you have like, twelve other dogs?" Naruto asked. Kiba remained silent as he fed his bag. "Oh yeah, did you guys hear about Ino?"

"Huh? What about her?" Lloyd asked, only vaguely remembering the blonde girl. She was one of many who were a member of his school's 'Kratos Aurion Fan Club'. In fact, if he remembered correctly, she and some pink-haired girl were co-presidents.

"She's been missing since Friday night," he told them all. Ling nodded.

"Yeah, I heard her dad's been going _crazy_ trying to find her."

"Oh, please," Kiba said, laughing. "Knowing her, she probably just got lost in the mall or something." They laughed for a moment before the piercing sound of the bell was heard. Lloyd groaned loudly, and began the depressing process of collecting his belongings.

"Wait, what do I have next period?" He asked as he slung his bag over his shoulder. Ling rolled his eyes.

"You know it's pretty sad that you can't even remember your own schedule, right?"

"You know it's even sadder that _you_ can?"

"… Grade twelves have gym next."

* * *

Lloyd never would have known how his day could have gotten worse until he walked out of the changing room to see Lulu standing at the far side of the gym, clipboard in hand. He mentally sighed in defeat, trudging over to what was sure to be his death: the girls' gym teacher.

The horror stories were numerous. The cardio, the kick-boxing… Lloyd shuddered. The worst of all were her activities on rainy days, if he'd heard correctly. He just thanked Martel that it was autumn, otherwise he'd call his dad to arrange a funeral then and there.

Walking over to Zelos who was on a bench, tying his shoes, Lloyd asked, "Do you know why Lulu's teaching the guys today, too?"

The redhead looked up. "I think Gai's on the field trip with the elevens. How'd you do on the chemistry test?"

Lloyd sighed, flopping down on the bench. "I'd rather not talk about that."

"Aw, cheer up, Bud! You're forgetting about the wonders of having Lulu teach!"

Lloyd stared at him. "What possible good could come from that monster?"

The redhead's eyes glazed over, and an all-too-familiar smirk crossed his face. "_Co-ed_…"

As if on cue, the grade twelve girls stepped out from the change room. There weren't many of them (Centennial Academy was known for two things: its ridiculous prices, and its lack of a student body), but something about that just made them all the more attractive to the male side of the grade. A few stood apart from the rest, of course, and those few were Sheena and Temari; neither of which were single, but both looked drool-worthy in a gym uniform. Well, drool-worthy for some. Lloyd himself had a different take on the whole 'female body' thing. What was it Zelos called it? Oh, yeah, 'complete innocence'. Sheena said it was that 'innocence' that made him the only grade twelve guy that wasn't a pig, and therefore the only one she would hang around with. The fact that Zelos also chose to hang around with Lloyd was something she tolerated, though barely.

"Why hello there my dearest and voluptuous Sheena," the redhead said upon her approach. "Care to do a few laps before we start?"

"I can hurt you," she stated, sitting down next to Lloyd on the bleachers.

"Ow…" Zelos cried, clutching his chest in mock pain. "Sheena, your words are like poison!"

"Good. Now be quiet before I start stabbing you with conjunctions."

Before Zelos could counter Sheena's remark, the piercing sound of Lulu's favourite whistle blasted through the room, and probably the whole school. Lloyd groaned. There was no escaping it now; the horrors of Lulu's gym class were about to begin. Lloyd, Zelos, and Sheena joined the mass of grade twelves moaning and groaning their way over to the source of the screeching whistle.

"Good afternoon, class," she said quickly, not looking up from her clipboard. "Since the classes are joined today, I suppose it would make sense to have a free period-"

"All right! Free period!"

"WOO!"

"-but since I don't believe in free periods, I've decided to do health instead," she finished. The students' groans grew in unison.

"Why don't we just play dodge ball?" Grimmjow suggested with a menacing sneer. Lloyd's eyes widened in fear.

"I second that!" Ikakku shouted. Of course _he_ would be open to the bloodbath that was grade twelves playing dodge ball.

"Yes, well, unfortunately, Mr. Madarame, I don't. Sorry Mr. Jeagerjacques, your suggestion is defeated due to Nurse Unohana's complaints from the last time. Today we'll be doing health, specifically the female anatomy."

"All right!" Zelos smiled. "Can Sheena demonstrate?"

SMACK.

"Mr. Wilder, you will refrain from making vulgar comments in this gym class. Ms. Fujibayashi, you will refrain from retaliating. Even if he does deserve it, and there will be no student demonstrations."

"Then can _you_ demonstrate?"

SMACK.

"Alright, Mr. Wilder has inspired a change of plans. Mr. Jeagerjacques, dodge ball it is; Mr. Wilder on one team, and the rest of the class on the other." She said before walking quickly away to get the balls. This time it was Zelos' eyes that widened in fear.

He gave Lloyd a pleading look, but the brunet shook his head, "No way, man, you got yourself into this mess."

"Thanks for the support."

"Anytime!" He cheered, following Sheena to the safety of the other team as Lulu returned pulling along a box full of shiny, red balls. She picked one off the top, and threw it into Grimmjow's hands.

"Mr. Jeagerjacques will start with the ball, and I'll be in my office. You're all in grade twelve so I'll assume you know how to 'play nicely'."

Lloyd didn't like the sound of Grimmjow's maniacal laughter as he tossed the ball up and down with one hand, but he was damn sure that however unpleasant it was for him, it was worse for Zelos. But for the moment, Lloyd was going to enjoy the five minutes or so he had of pummelling Zelos, because he figured it was around the end of that time that they'd turn on the next in line of easy prey. In other words, him. Suddenly he wondered if it was too late to call his dad about those funeral arrangements...

* * *

Walking down the hall to French next to a whining Zelos was trying indeed. The redhead had managed to protect his 'precious' face despite the many shots aimed there by Grimmjow, and was now voicing his complaints to Lloyd who was, of course, ignoring him. Lloyd was busy nursing his own wounds; he'd been right about them turning on him, of course. By the end of the period, the game had become a very unfair battle between the members of Centennial Academy's own gang (led by none other than Grimmjow) and the rest of the students in the class. Sheena put forth a valiant effort, but the gang both overpowered and outnumbered them.

He felt arms wrap around him and jumped, suddenly brought out of his thoughts. "Buuuud, are you even listening to me?" The redhead behind him complained. Lloyd sighed, but Sheena interjected from beside him before he could reply.

"Hey, stop bothering Lloyd! Seriously, I don't know how he can put up with you sometimes! And come on, both of you, you're blocking the hall."

Pouting, Zelos let go of his friend, smoothing out some wrinkles on the other's shoulder, and they continued to walk down the hallway. Lloyd was lost in his thoughts deeper than before, a light pink just barely dusting his cheeks; though it was almost impossible to see in the strange fluorescent lighting of the school.

Again, however, he didn't have much time to dwell on his thoughts as they entered the foreign language room, signs written in French, Spanish, and German greeting them. Zelos and Lloyd took their usual seats at the edge of the middle rows of desks. The back was taken up entirely by the members of Grimmjow's gang (who really only pushed everyone around and made a lot of noise), as it was in every period.

The bell rang to signal the beginning of class, and (as per usual) the teacher had not yet shown up. Kakashi Hatake – or Monsieur Hatake, as students were to call him – was infamous for always showing up at least ten minutes late. There were suspicions that he would be later if it weren't for the fact that the entire class would leave after longer than fifteen minutes.

Surely enough, their consistently late teacher appeared in the door five minutes (which was possibly a new record) later. The class paid no attention to this; they had a steady routine in French class. Monsieur Hatake would show up late, and they'd keep talking for at least twenty minutes, when he'd finally start the lesson. He would talk with the students sometimes in the pre-lesson time, and today he walked over to Lloyd and Zelos, the latter of which was trying to help the former with the previous night's homework.

"Bud, what's so hard about conjugating 'er' verbs?"

"Everything! How do I remember what endings to use?"

The redhead sighed. "Yeah, knowing your memory, you'll never get it..."

"Hey!"

"We having fun over here?" The teacher interrupted, smiling. Lloyd let out a frustrated sigh as Zelos laughed and replied.

_« Bonjour, Monsieur Hatake._ »

_« Bonjour, Wilder. Comment ça va? »_

_« Ça va bien, merci. Et vous ? »_

_« Ah, ça va bien aussi. »_ He gestured toward Lloyd. _« Il a des problèmes avec ses devoirs? »_

Zelos laughed again. _« Oui, oui. Il pense que les verbes 'er' sont trop difficiles à mémoriser. »_

They both laughed at this, and Lloyd merely looked between the two, confused beyond belief. He had a feeling they were laughing at _him_, but due to his lack of skill concerning anything to do with the French language, there wasn't a chance in hell he'd ever understand them.

_« Oh, Monsieur, j'ai oublié – j'ai un rendez-vous avec le médecin, alors je quitterai la classe dans… environ quinze minutes. »_ Zelos told their teacher, who nodded.

_« Avez-vous une note ? »_

"Yeah, right here," Zelos handed over a white sheet of paper. Thank the GODDESS they were going to start speaking in English again.

"Okay, you know when to leave."

After this exchange, the conversation died out. Lloyd looked hopelessly back down at his homework, while the teacher left and Zelos looked around the room. The redhead spoke up after a few moments.

"Hm..."

"Huh? What is it?" Lloyd looked up and tried to follow Zelos' gaze across the room.

"That L guy... He's eating cake..." And surely enough, he was. With his hands.

"Uh, yeah, he's always eating something. Like last period, he was eating some kind of candy. Though if Lulu caught him, he'd probably be dead..."

"Heh, maybe the 'L' stands for 'El Riskayyy'."

Just as Lloyd started laughing, there was a lull in conversation throughout the room. So, of course, everyone turned to stare at the now embarrassed brunet, whose face was quickly turning the same colour as his friend's hair. Said friend looked at the clock, and started to get up to leave.

Conversation started to pick up again after the class stopped looking at Lloyd, and he turned to the redhead beside him. "Hey, where are you going?"

"I have a doctor's appointment."

"What? Why didn't you say anything before?"

"I did, but it was in French." He grinned and waved goodbye to his friend, who huffed and again looked toward his homework.

Just as Zelos closed the door, the silver-haired teacher went to the front of the class and announced,

"Put away your binders, there's a quiz today based on last night's homework."

Yeah, today was _not_ a good day.

* * *

What with what was probably a complete failure on the chemistry test, and what was _definitely_ a complete failure on the French quiz, not to mention the savage dodge ball game in gym class, Lloyd was just about certain that nothing could make the day worse.

But Murphy's Law is a sadistic bastard when applied to life (especially his), and he mentally groaned when he turned the corner outside the school to see the gang lying in wait for easy prey – him, for example.

He tried turning back before any of them noticed him, but to his dismay, Grimmjow called out to him before he could put a safe distance between himself and the group.

"Hey, you! Aurion!"

Lloyd cringed and stopped in his tracks. Sighing, he turned around. "Yeah?"

The blue-haired (was that _natural_?) thug sauntered up to him, grinning. Lloyd knew he was in for it.

"Why're you always wearing those dorky suspenders? I mean-" he reached out to grab one of said suspenders (which were _not_ dorky, thank you very much), but a hand that was most definitely _not_ Lloyd's own stopped him.

"Grimmjow, just leave him be, or did you _want _to fail math this semester?" A familiar voice interrupted, and Lloyd looked behind him to see an immediately recognizable shock of bright orange hair. Ichigo coughed a few times, and Grimmjow smirked.

"I don't think you're in any position to be threatening me, Strawberry." The smirk on his face grew wider and more menacing.

"No, actually, I'm in the perfect position to." He sneezed before continuing. "Like I said before, I can stop those tutoring sessions."

Grimmjow's smirk faltered for a second. "You wouldn't."

"I would."

Lloyd looked uncertainly between the two, watching the intense stares they were aiming at each other. After a moment, Grimmjow frowned and gave a glare at each before turning around and returning to his gang.

Lloyd let out a sigh of relief. "Thanks, Ichigo... But hey, I thought you went home sick. What're you still doing here?"

Ichigo coughed some more before answering, "I called, but of course my dad wasn't home, and I forgot my key, so I stayed in the nurse's office all day." Lloyd nodded before a wave of realization hit him, bringing dread along with it.

"SHIT I'M GONNA MISS MY BUS BYE!" He yelled to Ichigo, who looked more than a bit surprised at the sudden outburst.

Running as fast as his legs could take him, Lloyd ran for the bus, barely managing to stop the doors from closing.

"Ahaha! Don't be such a spoilsport, Lloyd! You know it's more fun when you don't make it in time!" The bus driver laughed maniacally and started driving before Lloyd could take his seat (he swore the man was clinically insane).

"Yeah, FUN," he muttered darkly, taking a seat beside the Ulquiorra kid again.

After another long, torturous bus ride, Lloyd was finally off the damned machine, heading home. Hefting his backpack up, he input the code to open the gate and began the long trek up the driveway. Unsurprisingly, there were two cars parked in front of the house, his father's being neither of them.

Walking in the door, he called "Who is it this time?" as he took his shoes off and dropped his backpack. He noticed a pair of pink heels and black leather shoes on the shoe mat, which meant any one of his dad's male colleagues and...

"Why, hello, Lloyd! How was your day? You aren't going to go play with your friends?" Speak (or, well, think) of the devil...

Angie Thompson. There were no words to describe just how utterly _annoying_ she was. For one, she was one of the many women who ogled over his dad. He didn't want to think about how aggravating that would get, at work of all places... Another thing: she treated him like a _kid_. His theory was that she was trying to put herself into the 'mother role' of the house, which she seemed to think furthered her chances with his dad. It was obvious that everyone who had ever been around her had come to similar conclusions about her actions, and it was equally as obvious that it would never work. Somehow she either completely ignored this (or was just completely oblivious to it), though, because she kept on trying.

"I'm fine. Who else is here?" Lloyd preferred spending as little time as he possibly could in the presence of this woman.

Presumably from having heard himself being mentioned, Maes Hughes appeared from around the corner.

"Hey, Lloyd! How are you?"

This man was plenty more bearable than most other co-workers of his dad's, but still had his... quirks. The biggest thing was the man's apparent _need_ to show everyone around him the many pictures he had of his wife and daughter. There was no escaping once he pulled out those pictures...

"I'm okay, thanks. You?" He replied, planning escape routes for when the man decided to pounce with his photos.

"Great, thanks! Hey, did you know that it's my darling little Elysia's third birthday soon? Gracia and I went out and got pictures done! Look at what a little angel she is! She is the single most adorable little girl ever to be born!" He continued ranting in a similar manner, and out of the corner of his eye, Lloyd noticed Angie quietly shuffling away.

There was no way she was escaping while he had to suffer.

"Say, Mr. Hughes," he interrupted the other's speech, "has Angie seen these _wonderful_ pictures yet?" Lloyd inwardly smirked in triumph as the woman stopped in her tracks.

"Actually, she has, but there's no harm in seeing them more than once!" He moved over to her, beginning his tirade over.

Quietly as he could, Lloyd snuck out of the room, heading for the staircase (but not before noticing and smirking at the glare Angie was aiming at him).

Finally, he had escaped the horrors of his dad's colleagues! The people who invited themselves over constantly, treating the house (though it was a bit large to be called that) as a public area, believing they were free to come and go as they pleased!

Finally getting to the top of the stairs and the end of the hall, Lloyd pulled his key out of his pocket and unlocked his door. He closed and locked it behind himself before flopping down on his couch. His couch that had taken him a considerable amount of time and effort to convince his dad that he _needed_...

Reflecting on his day, it had turned out pretty badly (big understatement there). What with having been late for the torture device they call a school bus, failing that chemistry test, being almost slaughtered in gym and failing that French quiz (not to mention meeting Grimmjow after school), there wasn't much that went well. Except for breakfast, of course. Which reminded him...

Sitting up and leaning against an arm rest, he grabbed the phone from a side table. Scrolling through the address book, he heard a tap at his window. Looking over, he saw a rock hit the glass after a moment and smiled. He got up, setting the phone down on the cushions and walking over to the window. Opening it, he looked down to see a very familiar redhead, who grinned.

"How do you manage to climb over the fence all the time?" Lloyd asked, still smiling.

Zelos smirked. "With love's light wings did I o'erperch these walls; for stony limits cannot hold love out, and what love can do, that dares love attempt," he replied dramatically. The brunet rolled his eyes. He never had liked Shakespeare...

"So, you coming up?"

The redhead grinned again and began carefully climbing up the wall via the ivy crawling up the bricks. Lloyd moved back to the couch, picking up the phone again. Once again, he scrolled through the menu, and he now pressed the 'talk' button as he reached the Uchihas' number. While he waited for someone to answer, he sat on the couch, back against the arm rest.

Zelos dropped gracefully through the open window just as a voice came through from the phone.

_"Hello?"_

"Hey, Sasuke. Just calling to say thanks for breakfast." His redheaded friend was now sitting cross-legged in front of him on the couch, and reached to start fixing Lloyd's tie.

"_Oh, no problem. Itachi got carried away again and ended up feeding the neighbourhood."_

Lloyd chuckled at this and glanced across to Zelos, who seemed engrossed in making Lloyd's tie absolutely perfect.

"_Is Zelos there, by any chance?"_

"Uh, yeah. We're, uh... working on a project. Why?"

"_Hn. Just wondering. He left his Rubik's Cube here, so remind him to pick it up."_

"Huh? A Rubik's Cube?"

"_Yeah, don't ask. I'm not sure either."_

"Okay, then. I'll tell him. See you around, I guess."

_"Hn."_

With that, Lloyd pressed 'off' and ended the call. He set the phone on the ground before turning to the redhead who was just finishing on his tie. Before he could say anything about the Rubik's Cube (sometimes it was better with Zelos to just not ask), he was pulled forwards by said tie and felt soft lips pressing against his own. Smiling just slightly, he closed his eyes and kissed back. He moved a hand to tuck some stray strands of hair behind Zelos' ear.

After a few moments, the two pulled away for air. "I was supposed to tell you something..." Lloyd murmured.

"That we should do that again?" His (albeit secret) boyfriend replied, smirking.

"Yeah, that was it..."

The two leaned in for another kiss. Zelos began to lean over Lloyd, pressing the latter's back into the arm rest of the couch.

The doorknob shook slightly before the door opened, and a small head poked inside the room.

"FOUND HIM, NEL!" Yachiru yelled down the hall. "Ewww, he's with that _guy_ again!"

Zelos broke the kiss to start laughing, and Lloyd groaned.

Babysitting.

His door needed another lock.

* * *

**For Fullmetal Alchemist - we're going by the manga and Brotherhood, not the pile of crap that's the first anime. So if you don't know who Ling is, but are an FMA fan, SHAME.**

**Please review; we're very excited to see what others think of this!**

**- princespeach and Thingbe**


	2. On Relationships

**Chapter two! We loved writing this chapter. It was loads of fun. Thankfully, there's not as much to say here as there was at the beginning of chapter one. Sorry for putting you through something like that, but you're awesome if you bore through it to read the fic! What with winter break rapidly approaching, we hope to get chapter three (and maybe chapter four) out with less of a wait. Emphasis on the hope, because we're really just procrastinators when you get right down to it. We'll try our best, though!**

**Now please enjoy chapter two, and – as always – thank you for reading!**

**- princespeach and Thingbe**

**Disclaimer: Naruto, Tales of Symphonia, Bleach, FMA, .Hack, Facebook, MSN, Legend of Zelda and Mario.

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Chapter 2 – On Relationships

"_The spaces between your fingers were created so that another's could fill them in." – Unknown_

_C'mon… YOU CAN DO THIS!_ The whiskered blond told himself with a determination he just couldn't seem to maintain. _This is easy! You can do it! Just… GO!_

Naruto stood up from his chair, staring ahead at his target: Colette Brunel. She was alone, sitting by the window and seemingly spaced out. The library was empty except for them, which was a rare occurrence. Centennial Academy's library was very well-stocked (or so he had heard). Few students cared about the actual _books_ in the library, though; it was prized for other reasons. First of all, a good quarter of it was sectioned off to hold twenty state-of-the-art computers, printers, photocopiers, and a whole pile of other things that Naruto didn't have a name for. These computers were almost always taken up by the many students printing and finishing homework, Facebooking, MSNing, and satisfying unhealthy addictions to the World. As if that wasn't enough to make the library the number one place to hang out, there was the wonderful layout. The multitude of tables, corners, stacks, and even an unsupervised basement made for the perfect make-out paradise. Everywhere you went (under tables, in-between stacks, and _especially_ the lower level), young couples were going at it. The school's librarian Mr. Grantz had, after years of experience, decided that it was easier to just let the students have their way – all he asked was that the books were left out of whatever it was they were doing. This was why it was so _incredible_ that the library was empty now (although he would have bet money _someone _was fooling around in the basement). Still, the top floor was deserted, and this was his only chance… He had to go now if he was ever going to.

… Yep, this was his chance…

Naruto sat back down again.

"Damn it," he grumbled before proceeding to periodically bash his head against the table.

"Tried to ask her out again, huh?" Naruto turned his head – it was Ichigo. That was weird. He knew that Ichigo (being a walker) usually came to school early, but…

"Aren't you sick?" He asked as his classmate sat down in the chair across from him.

"Not sick enough to spend the whole day with my dad, and don't change the subject," he said, inclining his head towards Colette, who was still staring out the window.

"Huh?" Naruto said in badly-feigned confusion. "I don't know what you're-"

"Yeah, yeah, whatever," he interrupted, waving his hand dismissively. "You know, if you don't hurry up, you'll lose your chance."

"Ha! As if I'd ever let _that_ happen!" The blond said, a familiar confidence coming into his voice. "If I really liked someone there wouldn't be anything that could stand in my way! Naruto Uzumaki has no fear!"

"Oh, hey Colette."

The triumphant smile vanished from his face in an instant, and he let out a small yelp that was unfortunately just loud enough for Ichigo to hear. His head turned slowly to glance behind him. Colette was still at the other side of the room. _Damn it…_

"Oh yeah, no fear," Ichigo said to him, laughing.

Naruto sank deeper into his chair. "Shut up, Ichigo…"

A few moments later the two boys could clearly hear the sounds of the shuffling feet followed by the groaning and moaning sounds of teenagers forced into unwanted wakefulness by their alarm clocks. It seemed that the morning buses were starting to arrive.

Naruto sighed; now it really _was_ too late… He watched solemnly as Colette's best friend Orihime Inoue started a conversation with her, successfully making her completely unapproachable.

Naruto was so busy ogling over his would-be girlfriend that he barely noticed when more of the early bus' students began to crowd his own table.

"He ask her out yet?" Envy asked Ichigo while taking a large bite out of his chocolate bar.

The orange-haired boy shook his head. "Nah, he chickened out again."

"Again?" Ling asked, suddenly appearing behind them with Envy's chocolate bar somehow in his mouth. "The Halloween dance is next week! What's he waiting for?"

"Sitting right here, guys," Naruto said dryly.

"You know," Ling continued, ignoring the blond's comment, "Colette's pretty cute; if you don't ask her soon, someone else will."

"Eh, she's not that cute," Envy said, squinting at the smiling girl. "Ed's way cuter."

"Somehow I don't think anyone here is going to agree with you on that."

"Darn, not even you, Ichigo?" Envy asked jokingly.

"What?" The carrot-topped boy asked, looking strangely startled.

"Hey! I know!" Ling yelled suddenly as he grinned at Naruto. "You just had your birthday, right? Maybe you can get Colette to go out with you as a belated birthday present!"

"Ling, shut up, or I'm telling Sheena you said Colette was cute."

The dark-haired boy quieted instantly in response to Naruto's threat. Sheena, his girlfriend of three months, could be scary sometimes…

"Seriously though, Naruto," Envy continued in Ling's place. "Why don't you just ask her? You _know_ she'd say yes."

"Really?" The blond asked hopefully. "Heh, 'cause of my awesome looks and heroic attitude, right?"

"No, actually, I was thinking more because she's too nice to say no. Even to _you_," he finished, laughing.

"Shut up!" Naruto half-yelled. "You know what? I _will_ ask her! I'll ask her the next time I talk to her!"

"Hey, Naruto…"

The blond jumped in his seat as he instantly recognized the sweet, soft voice that could only belong to one person.

"C-C-Colette…"

"Well!" Envy said triumphantly, clapping his hands together and rising from his seat. "I'm feeling a sudden urge to go wait outside Ed's locker, how 'bout you guys?"

The other two quickly stood as well and gathered their things in less time than seemed possible.

"See ya, Naruto!" Ling said with a small wave.

Envy smiled widely. "Wow, you guys are actually coming with me?"

They said nothing, but Ichigo made sure to smack the love-sick boy upside the head as they walked out. Naruto sent the most threatening glare he could to their shrinking backs, but that didn't change the fact that he was now alone with-

"You're here early today…" Colette noted. She was trying to make conversation.

Naruto nodded dumbly. "Yeah, I got a ride off Iruka this morning so I could… finish some homework." The lie would be perfectly acceptable if it were coming from anyone but Naruto, who was well-known for not doing any homework (or school work in general); it was still far better than admitting the sad truth that he came here to admire her from afar and try desperately to find the courage to ask her out, however.

"Oh, that's great!" She said to him. Whether she actually believed him or not, he couldn't tell – but it was Colette, so he knew she wouldn't say anything either way. "Did you need help with anything?"

"Ah, no, that's okay, it's all done now," he said, fumbling about in his bag to show he was packing up.

"Alright," she said before frowning. "Naruto, is there something wrong?"

"Huh?"

"You just seem sort of…" She struggled for the right words. "I-I mean… was there something you wanted to… ask me?"

Naruto was glad that by now her cheeks were a bright red; it made his own blush slightly less embarrassing. But only slightly. "I… Uh… Y-yeah, actually…" He struggled as well for a moment before swallowing hard. "D-Do you want to go to the dance with me?"

The words came out in such a garbled mess that Naruto was sure he'd have to repeat the dreaded question, but she took less than a second to answer. "I'd love to!" She cheered, beaming at him.

He smiled too, feeling as if some heavy weight had been lifted from his chest. "Really?"

She giggled. "Mhm."

"That's…" He didn't know what to say... He was going to the dance with the girl of his dreams. What did you say to that? "… Great." He finished lamely after a moment. Suddenly the bell rang – five minutes to get to class. Damn, why did his locker have to be at the opposite end of the ridiculously large school? "I, uh, gotta go…" He admitted reluctantly.

She nodded. "Alright, I'll talk to you later then."

He smiled again at the prospect of further conversation with the girl. "Okay, I'll… I'll call you tonight!"

She smiled too and nodded again before he hurried off, leaving the girl standing there.

"So…?" Another girl, Orihime, asked her still-blushing friend.

"He's gonna call me tonight."

The orange-haired girl smiled. "See? I told you he'd say yes!"

* * *

"So, did anybody do their homework?"

Mr. Hohenheim's question was met with mixed reactions; some looked around the room awkwardly, some groaned, and those who actually _did_ their homework nodded. Ichigo rolled his eyes at Naruto, who was too busy grinning madly to pay any attention to the teacher. Or, well, anything else. The bouncing blond had been talking about nothing but the dance since he'd run through the classroom door, barely missing the bell.

"Only ten days until the dance! Wow, I'm so excited! Hey Ichigo, what should I go as? What do you think Colette's gonna go as? Should we match? Is that too lame? Hey, Ichigo, are you-"

"Naruto, you sound like a girl. You're calling her tonight, right? Just talk about it then," he interrupted, finishing with a sneeze. Ichigo turned to face the front of the room just in time for their teacher to start explaining a new assignment.

"-fun project yet! I guarantee you guys will love it!" Mr. Hohenheim was being pretty cheerful about it, and the class looked up at him eagerly.

"For your unit summative, you will be..." A dramatic silence hung in the air. "... making brochures on a genetically modified food! In _pairs_!"

The class sat in a slight state of shock over the anti-climactic announcement. It took a few seconds before protests broke out around the room. Raising a hand, the teacher silenced his students' objections (for the most part) and began speaking again. "Now listen, Ed liked this project, so you all should too."

"But Mr. Hohenheim, Ed likes _all_ science projects. Besides, I don't think he'd be very happy knowing you brought him up in class again," Kiba spoke up. They had heard enough of Ed's ranting to know very well that he didn't appreciate his father talking about him to other students. At all.

The man waved the comment off and went on to describe the details of the project. Much to most of the students' dismay, he had chosen the pairs already. They had a week to research a genetically modified food and put it together in a brochure, with pictures. In other words, yet another pointless assignment that would end up being worth a _lot_ of marks.

"Alright, so now I'll tell you your partners. Let's see... Ichigo and Ling, Naruto and Sasuke-"

"What? Why're you putting me with a bastard like him?" Naruto shouted, pointing at said 'bastard', who only rolled his eyes.

"Naruto, we will refrain from cursing in this class. You two are partners because it worked out that way. Now, if there are no further interruptions, I'll continue." He did just that, Naruto sinking into his seat.

Ichigo sighed at how the blond could go from indescribably happy one minute to scowling and angry the next. The orange-haired teen coughed a few times before saying, "Don't forget that you're going to the dance with Colette."

Predictably, Naruto grinned again and this time, not even the prospect of spending time with Sasuke could ruin his mood.

* * *

Music class with the grade elevens was a very interesting thing indeed. Though the school had seemingly limitless amounts of money, the only instruments to be played were ocarinas. It didn't help matters that the teacher wore an abnormal amount of scarves, leaving only their face visible. Stranger yet was their teaching style; it was one that none of the students could follow.

Ed watched with the rest of the class as the teacher played a new song. It was simple, considering how few notes it used. The teacher then looked at the class expectantly. There it was: Sheik's teaching style. In other words? Play the song, get the students to play it back. There was only one person in the whole class who could do this: the mute kid, Link. Who was now, of course, playing back the melody, but with many more flourishes.

This was his least favourite part of the day, watching Link play in music class. It always bothered Ed that he wasn't getting the top marks in any given subject. Though, he took comfort in the fact that music was so far the only one that anybody was doing better than him in.

Link reached the end of the song and the class clapped, bringing a large smile to his face. As usual, Colette began excitedly congratulating him on how well he could play. Ed sighed. He really didn't want to be here...

Something buzzed. His phone? He looked down into his bag where said phone lay, and up at the teacher who was now playing a duet with Link. It was safe. Stealthily pulling his cell out of his backpack, Ed opened it to find a message from Envy: _come 2 the bathroom_.

Rolling his eyes, he answered with a _no, in the middle of class_ and put his phone back in its place, only for it to buzz again. Once more, he opened it, to find the same message. He gave the same answer, and the cycle repeated for a few more minutes before he gave up and answered _fine, be there in a few_.

"May I go to the bathroom?" Ed asked after teacher and student had finished playing, raising his hand. The teacher nodded, and he tucked his phone back in his bag before leaving the room.

The halls were unsurprisingly empty, and Ed took his time heading towards the heavy door of the boys' bathroom. He pushed this door aside and attempted to look around the small room, though there wasn't much time for this; soon after entering, he was pushed up against the wall by his boyfriend in record speed.

Skinny arms wrapped around his waist and Ed smiled. "Hey, Envy," he greeted, bringing his arms around the other teen.

Grinning, Envy asked, "So, music is alright to miss but nothing else is?"

The blond frowned slightly. "'Everything else' is English, biology, and physics. I'd say those are all pretty important. Wait... you're missing chemistry, aren't you?" He asked with a sigh.

"Yup. But your dad doesn't exactly hate me, so it's all good."

"Fine, whatever. I still think you should care about school a little more."

"Did you really want to be talking about this right now?" Envy moved closer to Ed, their faces mere centimetres apart.

"We're still talking about this later," was his reply, and Envy chuckled.

"I know."

They closed the distance between themselves as their lips met. Both shifted closer, deepening the kiss.

After a while, when the lunch bell rang, they jumped and left to hurry to their respective classes for their bags, but not before a final peck on the lips and a grin from each.

* * *

Crammed in the corner of a small janitor's closet, there wasn't much room to move. That, however, was of little importance to the couple against the back wall. Zelos had a spray bottle of some sort digging into his back, and something had fallen on Lloyd a little while ago, but neither could care less as they shared passionate kisses and a close embrace. They both took time to breathe, leaning their foreheads together. Lloyd's smile was barely discernible in the dim light, but Zelos felt it when a light kiss was pressed against his cheek.

"We should get going now," Lloyd murmured, but the tone of his voice betrayed a different meaning.

"There's always later," came the reply, and their lips pressed together once again. Right after, the light in the small room turned on, and both boys jumped at the sight of the school janitor.

"Mamma mia, kids these days. Have no respect for the janitors. And two boys, no less. What is the world coming to?" The two in the corner grinned sheepishly as Mario got the broom he was looking for, shaking his head and muttering all the while. He shut the light off as he left, a final 'click' signalling the close of the door.

"Think he'll tell anyone?" Lloyd asked, suddenly worried about what would happen if word got out. He wasn't quite ready for anyone to know yet, not even his friends. Though Sasuke was observant enough that he probably suspected something...

"No, who's he got to tell? The garbage cans? He might tell Luigi, but I don't think he cares enough to say anything," Zelos replied, fixing Lloyd's collar.

"I hope so…"

"Don't worry so much. He won't tell anybody. Now, where were we?"

Another few minutes of bliss lasted until the door was opened yet again. This time, however, it was two students. The couple in the closet froze as they heard voices drift in.

"Come on, it's unlocked! Hurry up!" A demanding female voice hissed, obviously trying to not get caught.

"Okay, okay. I'm co-" Came a lazy voice, this time male. Its owner stopped talking to gape at the two inside, revealed now by the light streaming in through the open door.

"What's the matter? See a spider or some... thing..." The female voice started to snap, but she also stopped to gape at the two wrapped around each other.

Zelos and Lloyd both stared back, saying nothing; no excuse could make up for their tangled limbs and messy uniforms. The female student – Temari, as they now knew from seeing her – was the first to recover.

"Well, well, well. What do we have here?" She put both hands on her hips and smirked.

Then the owner of the male voice – identifiable as Shikamaru – put on the same kind of smirk and only said, "Interesting."

"Think the others might like to hear about this?" She asked.

"Definitely. Let's go."

By this point, Lloyd was very, very distressed. "Mario won't tell anyone, but what about those two? They're going to tell _everyone_!"

"Well, look at it this way. Now we can make out in public." Zelos chuckled as Lloyd groaned and rested his forehead against the other's shoulder in defeat.

Standing around the corner of the cafeteria doors, Zelos was trying (however unsuccessfully) to calm Lloyd down.

"Look, Bud, even if they _did_ tell people, it'll take a while for it to get out. Don't worry so much." He swept a couple of wrinkles off Lloyd's shoulder.

Lloyd sighed. That was true... "Okay. But what will we do when everyone finds out? It won't be too long."

"We can talk about that later. For now, just do your best and act natural." They began to turn to enter the cafeteria, but stopped in their tracks when they heard Grimmjow shout,

"Oh my God, really? Wilder and _Aurion_? In the _janitor's closet_?"

At this, all other noise in the normally bustling cafeteria came to a halt (that is, except for the obnoxiously loud laughter of Grimmjow). Lloyd turned back around to face Zelos, anxiety written in his expression.

"Didn't think of that…" Zelos muttered, scratching the back of his head. "Okay, change of plan. Here, just trust me," he said, taking Lloyd's hand in his own. Before Lloyd could stop him or ask what he was doing, they were in the cafeteria and every face was turned towards them. Grimmjow even stopped laughing to simply sit there and grin maliciously at the two. Zelos smirked and led Lloyd to the table where the brunet's friends were all sitting. He planted a kiss on the top of Lloyd's head as he sat him down, and walked confidently to his own seat. Noise erupted all around them as soon as Zelos sat down, smirk still in place.

Ignoring the questioning shouts from his friends (or, rather, Naruto), Lloyd dropped his head against the table in front of him. Naruto kept shouting, with Kiba still in a stupor. Ling continued to eat as though nothing had happened, Ed was giving him a sympathetic look, and Ichigo looked a little nervous – though he gave a sympathetic look similar to Ed's.

"What the hell was _that_? Are you two- Why didn't you- You're- ARGH!" Naruto yelled, flailing his hands in every direction and barely missing Kiba's head. By now, he'd recovered, and was trying along with Ed to calm Naruto down before he hurt someone.

Seeing what was going on, Colette rushed over with Orihime following close behind.

"Naruto, please stop! I'm sure Lloyd has a perfectly good reason for not telling anyone! Please, calm down!" Colette pleaded once she arrived, standing in front of Naruto, who was now trying to get out of his chair and make his way around the table to Lloyd. At seeing her, he stopped yelling, but continued to glare in Lloyd's direction.

"Alright. But he'd _better_ have a good reason."

"Thank you. So, Lloyd, we would like for you to please explain why you kept this from your friends," she said, turning to fully face him.

Lloyd sighed. He hadn't quite prepared himself for this. Actually, he'd never even thought that something like it would ever happen. With a sigh, he lifted his head up to attempt an answer, though Ed interrupted him.

"Guys, don't you think we should give him a little time to sort things out? I don't think he's really ready to explain much of anything right now."

"I think that's a good idea. He can explain everything later," Orihime added. Everybody else nodded, Naruto included (albeit reluctantly).

"Okay. I'll take him to Nurse Unohana to get away from all this. The rest of you might want to get ready for other people's questions," Ed finished, grabbing Lloyd's arm and dragging him away.

When they were in the hall and finally away from the noise and questioning looks, Lloyd finally spoke up. "Thanks," he told Ed. "For, you know, rescuing me…"

"Yeah, it's no problem. Remember, I've been in that kind of position before, too. It isn't easy dealing with all those questions at once."

He sighed. "So, what time is it?"

"About 12:25. Why?"

Lloyd shook his head slightly. "Just wondering." His dad's co-workers should be there still, raiding the fridge on their lunch break. The blond beside him nodded, and there was a comfortable silence between the two before Lloyd spoke up again. "And, you know, thanks... for not interrogating me, that is..."

His friend smiled. "Hey, I know what it's like. Even though the situation's... slightly different, it's essentially the same, right? Everybody wants to know why it was a secret, how long it's been going on, yadda yadda."

Lloyd gave a slow nod, sighing again.

"And hey, if you ever need any help, I'm here, okay?" The blond smiled more. "I should be heading back for some damage control... You gonna be alright?"

"Yeah, I'll just hide out in the nurse's office for the rest of the day or get a ride home. Thanks again, really."

Ed grinned. "Hey, what are friends for? See you later."

"Yeah, see you." They both waved, and Lloyd was left alone to his thoughts.

The whole thing was a mess. Yeah, Zelos had helped the situation a lot by outright confirming it, because they wouldn't have to live with the rumours... On the other hand, he still wasn't really ready for everyone to know. He wasn't ready at all...

Gah.

Looked like he'd be spending a lot of time thinking this afternoon.

He reached the door to the nurse's office, and opened it slightly, poking his head in.

"Er... Hello?" Lloyd asked into the empty room.

"I'm sorry. I'll be with you in a minute," a voice drifted through from an adjoining room. The person then appeared, and Nurse Unohana looked at the brunet for only a second before saying, "Oh dear, you look so flushed! Why don't you go lay down?"

Just then did he notice that he had been blushing fiercely the _entire time_. Mentally groaning, he nodded slightly at the nurse and followed her over to one of the many beds against the back wall.

"Alright, then. You rest for a while and tell me if you need anything." She put a hand on his forehead for a slight second before smiling. She began closing the curtains around the bed before he stopped her.

"Actually, would it be alright if I used the phone?" It'd be much easier to just go home, not to mention more comfortable (the beds in the nurse's office weren't exactly what one would call _soft_).

Nodding, she answered with a "Yes, that's fine." The nurse smiled and gestured to a wall near the beds. "The phone is right there. Tell me if you need anything else." She walked over to her desk, sat down, and began to work.

Lloyd went to the phone and dialled his number. He listened as it rang, and rang, and rang... and went to the answering machine.

Figures that the one time he actually _wanted_ to find a stranger in his house, there wasn't one. Or (more likely) there was, but it was some pompous ass like Aizen or Gin who wouldn't pick up a call from his school. And where did that leave him? Sitting on one of the horribly uncomfortable beds watching Nurse Unohana busying herself with paperwork on the other side of the room. He had probably until the end of lunch before she 'suggested' that he head back to class, and maybe another ten minutes after that before she guilted him into actually going. He could always take the easy way out and call his dad at work. But since that would involve telling him (and more than likely Angie) the specific reasons behind his 'sickness', it wasn't an option he was willing to consider. Basically, he was screwed.

Movement caught the corner of his eye, and he looked up to see Nurse Unohana rising from her desk. Was he being kicked out already? The tall woman stopped, facing the door. Was she talking to someone? Lloyd was too far away in the over-sized room to hear the woman's soft voice. The other, male voice, however, was impossible _not_ to hear. He watched as the kindly woman pointed in his direction, showing the unwanted visitor where he was hiding. Oh dear...

He slid off the bed to face the inevitable as he watched a whiskered blond – his best friend – approach him slowly. By the time he reached the brunet, Naruto looked as uncomfortable with the situation as Lloyd did. Neither of the boys looked at each other; Lloyd fiddled with his shirt cuff while Naruto dug his hands deep into his pockets and appeared to be closely examining the floor.

"Look, I didn't-"

"I never-"

The two boys stopped for a moment, laughing slightly at themselves before the silence settled in again.

"I'm... sorry," the blond said, struggling to find the right words.

Lloyd waited a moment, then laughed again. "You dork," he said. "What do you have to be sorry about?"

Naruto stared at him in surprise. "I, uh..." He blushed a little and one hand reached behind his head. "What I said to you back there, it was outta line."

"No it wasn't," the brunet told him, frowning. "I never should have kept it a secret from you." Naruto said nothing in reply, so Lloyd continued. "You're my best friend, Naruto. I should have known that I could trust you with anything, especially something as... _important_ as Zelos. I'm the one who should be apologizing here."

Naruto smiled, but shook his head. "You didn't feel like you could tell me about something as big as this; that means it's my fault too. Like you said, best friends need to trust each other."

Lloyd nodded, and then grinned with his friend. "Lesson learned?" He offered.

"Definitely," the blond agreed before embracing his friend in a classic 'man hug' to solidify their strengthened friendship, letting go after a moment.

"You know," Naruto said thoughtfully as he wandered over to one of the many beds. "Now that I think about it, you and Zelos... it _does_ explain a few things."

Lloyd cocked his head slightly. "It does?"

"Yeah." He lifted himself onto the bed. "You always came back from your 'locker' with your clothes all tidied up." He laughed. "It was kinda funny."

Lloyd blushed deeply as he recalled his boyfriend's odd little habit. "Y-yeah..."

Naruto laughed a little, all remnants of their quarrel long forgotten now. "It's so _weird_! You and Zelos? I mean he's so... so..."

"Zelos," Lloyd finished, knowing what the blond was getting at.

"Yeah..." Naruto looked at Lloyd. "How'd you two get together anyway?"

"Looooooong story," Lloyd said, pacing a little.

"C'mon! I'm curious!"

Lloyd rolled his eyes. "Let's just say that there were some interesting experiences in summer camp this year."

Naruto scoffed. "Sure, the _one_ year I don't go and something interesting happens. I should've known."

Lloyd laughed inwardly at the idea of Naruto being there to witness the events of that small, isolated cabin in the woods...

"Trust me, it's probably better you stayed home."

Naruto thought about that for a moment before giving Lloyd an odd and slightly grossed-out look.

"That's..." He shook his head. "Too much information."

"Hey." Lloyd held his hands in the air as a show of innocence. "You asked me."

"Whatever," Naruto said, shifting around on the clearly uncomfortable bed. "You're not gonna stay here all day, are you?"

"That depends," Lloyd answered. "What's it like out there?"

Naruto's smile widened. "You really wanna know?"

No, not really. But it was necessary. "Yeah."

The blond laughed. "Well, the school's pretty divided. See, there's the Zelos fangirls; they're pretty upset about the whole thing, and last I saw Zelos was trying to 'console' them." Lloyd rolled his eyes a little, but said nothing and let his friend continue. "And then there's Ed. He was sticking up for you, aaaand a few people were agreeing with him. They're probably still sitting there trying to figure out how the hell they didn't notice anything. I don't think I have to tell you what the gang's up to, and..." He stopped to laugh a little. "Then there's a couple of people who've been trying to understand how a guy like you ended up with a guy like Zelos. They figure you're some kinda behind-the-scenes 'player' or something."

Lloyd laughed out loud at the thought of himself as any kind of 'player'. Still, he didn't like hearing the news that he and Zelos were still the only topic of conversation out there.

"This thing's not dying down anytime soon, huh?" Lloyd asked his friend.

Naruto's smile lessened. "Probably not… But hey! Who cares about them? The important thing is that you don't have to hide anything anymore."

Lloyd grinned. "You're right, Naruto! It doesn't matter what other people think! I'm happy with Zelos, and I'm happy that I don't have to lie to my friends anymore. That's all that really matters."

"Exactly!" Naruto cheered to the elevated brunet. "So, are you gonna go back to class?"

"Not a chance."

"But-"

"Nope." Lloyd shook his head. "I'm not that brave. And besides, I've got a French assignment due last period."

"You didn't do it, huh?" Naruto said with a smile of approval.

Lloyd shrugged. "I started to do it, but then Zelos came over to help and we got... side-tracked."

"Too much information..." Naruto said, shaking his head lightly and jumping off the uncomfortable bed. "So I guess I won't see you later then?"

Lloyd shook his head again. "I'll call you, though. We can distract each other from homework."

Suddenly the blond's attitude seemed to change, and an odd-looking grin swept over his face as he answered. "Nah, I've got plans for tonight..."

The younger teen started moving towards the door, but Lloyd was on him in a second, eyes wide with surprise.

"Whoa there," he said, standing in front of his friend. "What's that supposed to mean? What plans?"

Somehow Naruto's smile grew. "Heh, nothing. I'm just gonna be busy tonight."

His experience with Naruto told him that _something_ was up, and the expression on Naruto's face made it so that even Lloyd could piece together what it was.

Suddenly Lloyd's face brightened as he came to his conclusion. "You finally did it, didn't you? You asked Colette out on a date!"

"What do you mean, 'finally'?" He said in an angered tone, though he was still smiling.

"I can't believe it!" Lloyd continued, completely ignoring his friend's comment. "Congratulations, man! You finally got a girlfriend!"

"Again with the 'finally'!"

"So you're taking her out tonight then?" He asked quickly.

Naruto shook his head. "Halloween dance."

"Right!" Lloyd yelled. "Wait, when's that?"

Naruto rolled his eyes. "Your memory sucks. It's Halloween, next Friday."

"Really? That soon?" Lloyd said, more to himself, before smiling again at his friend. "And you've got a date!"

"You could sound a little less surprised..."

"Well, I'm trying to get used to the idea! I can't believe that you... you..." Lloyd frowned. "You _idiot_!"

Now Naruto frowned as well. "Huh?"

The suspender-wearing teen turned away from the blond, pacing a little. "Here we are, talking about how best friends shouldn't hide stuff from each other, and you were just gonna walk out of here without telling me you got a _girlfriend_? You're an idiot!"

"No!" Naruto started, completely clueless as to how he should approach the situation. "No, Lloyd, it's not like that, I just... forgot!"

Now Lloyd turned back to look hard at him. "You forgot?"

Naruto cringed. "Y-yeah?"

Lloyd closed his eyes and sighed. "You're such an idiot..."

"So you're not mad?"

He gave the blond a reassuring look. "No, not mad; I'm happy for you."

"Yeah?" Naruto asked again, happy this time.

"Of course. You've only been crushing on Colette since you were in grade seven-"

"I have _not_ been-"

"Yes you have," Lloyd insisted. "And she's been crushing on you too. For three years you haven't been able to hold a conversation with each other without turning into bright red stuttering tomatoes. I'm happy that now you can be bright red stuttering _dating_ tomatoes. Except not tomatoes... some other red fruit... apples. You can be apples."

"Tomatoes are a fruit?"

Lloyd's eyes narrowed. "The worst kind..."

"Lloyd?" The two boys looked up suddenly as Nurse Unohana approached them, carrying one cordless phone in her hand. "The phone's for you."

Lloyd nodded and accepted the phone. "Who is it?"

"I think he said he was your godfather."

Yuan. Finally, some good news. Lloyd quickly thanked the woman and raised the phone to his ear. Naruto mouthed a quick 'later' before walking off as well.

"_Lloyd?"_

"Hey, Uncle Yuan," Lloyd responded thankfully. Yuan of course wasn't his uncle, but little three-year-old Lloyd always liked to pretend he was, and the nickname sorta stuck after that.

"_Sorry about earlier; SOME people were too stupid to answer the phone." _He paused here to allow those people time to shout their inaudible excuse. _"Anyway, I just got in. What's wrong?"_

"Oh... nothing big. Just not feeling too well. Could you come pick me up?" Lloyd was glad it was Yuan; he knew what the man's answer would be.

"_Sure, I'll be there in twenty minutes."_

Lloyd smiled as he heard the click before the dial tone. That was why he was glad it was Yuan – there were no questions asked. Anyone else would have needed the guilt talk and possibly even bribery before agreeing to come, and then they definitely wouldn't have left him alone after that. Gossip was a big thing with the co-workers.

He headed over to return Nurse Unohana's phone and sit down for the long twenty-minute wait for freedom.

_Thirty_ minutes later, his ride arrived. Surprisingly, there was a large part of Lloyd that wished it hadn't. He thought that the ride would bring his rescue, but no; that would be too easy.

Instead, it was a police cruiser.

A big, flashy, partially neon police cruiser with the words 'Grand Cardinal Police Force' written clearly on the side. This was _not _his day. Still, he had no other option, and he could see Yuan's smiling face in the passenger's seat window, so he gave a resigned sigh and slid into the back seat. He wondered whether or not anyone had seen him get in. It didn't _look_ like anyone was there, but this was high school – _someone_ was there.

"Hey, Lloyd," Yuan greeted, leaning over the back of his seat to look at the teen.

He was smiling, and Lloyd knew why. "Hey, Yuan," he said nonchalantly. "Hey, Forcystus."

The driving turquoise-haired man smirked. "Lloyd."

Yeah, Yuan was always cheerier when his boyfriend was around.

"Thanks... for coming," Lloyd said a little awkwardly.

Yuan nodded. "Hey, I was in high school too once, I know how it is. Sometimes you just need a break."

"Yeah."

The rest of the drive was thankfully silent as far as conversation went. But then again, maybe conversation would have been better; it might have helped distract him from the two men loving each other in the front seats. Lloyd tried his best to keep his eyes on his window, but the drive home wasn't exactly a captivating sight, and there was nothing he could do about the sounds… or the reflection in his window.

It started slowly at first, Yuan inching inconspicuously closer to the driver's seat while Forcystus tried desperately to keep his eye on the road ahead. Then, when Yuan could get no closer without falling off his seat, the hands started. Forcystus was driving, so Yuan began by reaching over, softly stroking the man's arm. It being his automail gun arm (though the weapon only started at the elbow), he wasn't using it anyway and simply moved it so Yuan could cling easier and possibly reach the flesh half. Lloyd tried not to notice that Forcystus was now inching over to Yuan as well, and he was mildly worried about their safety as the policeman continued to have a more difficult time keeping his eyes on the road. After a minute or two the whispered comments started, small smiles appearing on both their faces. Lloyd held his own face in his hands and tried desperately to block out reality. One thing he never wanted (or needed) to know was what his uncle was doing with the chief of the police force…

By the time they actually got back to Lloyd's house, the two men were prime examples of an accident waiting to happen. Yuan was practically hanging off Forcystus, who somehow managed to drive properly while barely touching the wheel and looking away from his boyfriend as little as possible. It wasn't until the car came to a complete stop that the two managed to separate long enough to get out of the car, and by this time Lloyd was already fleeing to the front door.

The only good part of a really bad day is its end. Lloyd was eternally thankful as he stepped through the threshold and entered his home. Here, he could be alone with his thoughts, and maybe escape his growing worries about the day's events. Of course, this was only if he somehow managed to escape the swarms of co-workers no doubt lurking around his home. His worries were almost instantly confirmed as he walked into the main hall to find Yoruichi rooting around the kitchen. So she was here. She was one of the more annoying co-workers and her presence meant two things: one, Soi Fong was around here somewhere, and two, that they were almost certainly out of food. Looking around, Lloyd figured that his only escape was to make a run for the staircase before she saw him. Before he could move, however, Yuan and Forcystus stepped in, making no attempts to hide the noise of their arrival.

Yoruichi instantly turned, spotting the three males and rushing over to them. Lloyd doubled his efforts to reach the staircase and his bedroom in time, but the woman was freakishly fast. He barely made it up the first step when her hand grabbed his collar, pulling him back down.

"Hey! Lloyd's home!" She yelled loudly, more than likely in an attempt to annoy him. It was working. He struggled against the dark woman's grasp, but it was useless. "Did you have a nice day at school?"

Rather than attempt to explain the incredible UN-niceness of his day, Lloyd just glared.

"He's in high school, of course he didn't have a nice day," Yuan commented as he placed his and Forcystus' jackets on two of the many coat hooks.

Yoruichi frowned. "Lloyd's in high school? When did this happen?"

"About four years ago," Lloyd answered, getting more annoyed.

"Wow, you're getting old…" She continued. "Shouldn't you have a girlfriend by now?"

Incredible how she managed to find the worst thing she could possibly have said to him. Heading nearer and nearer to a mental breakdown, Lloyd twisted his way out of the woman's grasp and ran his way up the stairs, faintly hearing Yoruichi call after him something about his father being late just before he slammed his door shut, automatically turning the lock as he did so. The last thing he needed now was a concerned co-worker prying into his personal life. Slowly sinking into his couch, he waited for the world to end, or unconsciousness to kick in. Both would successfully get his mind off of the cesspool of stress that was high school.

He wasn't sure how long he sat there half-asleep and staring out into space, but he knew that it wasn't nearly long enough. Too soon an unfamiliar knocking sound came from his door. Lloyd didn't need to look to see who it was; there was only one person he knew that actually _knocked_ before entering.

"Hey, Dad," he greeted nonchalantly. "How was work?"

Kratos shrugged a little as he entered the room. "Alright. Angie was annoying."

"When _isn't_ she annoying?"

"Touché."

The ensuing silence had a tinge of awkwardness to it. They both knew that idle family chatting was not the purpose of Kratos' visit into the teen's personal space. Willing the inevitable 'father-son chat' not to happen, Lloyd sat silently. Unfortunately for him, his dad was unusually persistent.

"Did you have a good day at school?" The question was a lot less innocent than it sounded. Saying 'yes' would mean he was avoiding the subject, and it would prolong this awkward dance around the actual topic. Alternatively, saying 'no' would cut to the chase, but would show he was seriously upset, which would also end up lengthening the actual 'talk'. Not to mention that every second he deliberated, the closer Kratos got to being forced to assume the dreaded 'no' scenario.

Making his decision, Lloyd shrugged to show an uncaring attitude. "I've had worse."

This was entirely true. His first day as a niner had been _rough_. Even back then, his entire grade was full of assholes. Actually, the only difference between then and now was that they weren't as tall back then (except for Grimmjow. That guy had _always_ been huge.), and he himself had been a little less knowledgeable about the temperament of his peers…

Lloyd halted his painful stroll through memory lane when he noticed Kratos was still giving him the 'fatherly concern' look.

"What happened?" He asked in his usual all-too-cool manner. Combined with the concerned yet un-judging expression on his face, Lloyd had to admit that the effect looked pretty genuine, and it probably was. Seventeen years of experience had made the older male a master of parenting. This could be very helpful at times, but mostly it just put Lloyd at an annoying disadvantage – like now. The brunet squirmed as he realized his father's gaze was getting to him, chipping away at his shrinking willpower… He was about to cave.

"N-nothing really…" He mumbled, shifting uncomfortably in his seat. "People just sorta found out about… about Zelos and me…"

As suspected, Kratos' face showed a moment of wishing he'd never started the conversation. Teen relationships were always an awkward subject for parents, but they were also nearly impossible to hide. Many an awkward time Kratos had unknowingly walked in while Lloyd and Zelos were… entertaining each other.

However, even the knowledge that his 17-year-old son was doing unmentionable things with the next door neighbour wasn't enough to shake Kratos out of his cool and calm mind set. The topic of Lloyd's relationship had remained a blissfully untouched one before now, but the current situation was forcing Kratos to break this mutual silence. Still, to Lloyd's immense joy, he kept to the classic 'Kratos' parenting style that Lloyd was entirely accustomed to, and allowed his son to continue with his story.

"They caught us in the- uh, they caught us together, and then _Grimmjow_ found out and…" His voice faded after a moment as he let the words sink in, allowing his father to come to his own conclusions.

He seemed to understand completely, as always, and with one heavy sigh he sank down onto the couch beside Lloyd.

"Someone really has to _end_ that boy," he commented while bringing his hand to rest on his forehead.

Lloyd eyes widened in fear. "Zelos?"

"_Grimmjow_," he answered in exasperation.

"Ah," Lloyd answered, relief quickly wearing off as another silence ensued, this one much more comfortable than the last. Lloyd had to admit, he did feel better. Just telling someone – especially his father – seemed to make everything easier to deal with. Of course, he was still bombarded with feelings of nervousness and fear at the mere thought of what was going to happen next, but just as his forehead started to crease with worry, he felt a warm, comforting arm wrap around his shoulders. It pulled the teen in closer to his father, and Lloyd welcomed it. He realized that it had been a while since they'd had a heart-to-heart talk, and for the moment it was enough to just sit there curled up on the couch with his father like he had when he was a child, but eventually those pesky thoughts started troubling him again.

"I'm not so worried about today," Lloyd continued, quietly. "It's tomorrow that's the problem…"

His father nodded once. "Yes, tomorrow could be… difficult. But I think it'll be alright in the end."

Ignoring the fact that, as his father, Kratos was required to say that, he allowed himself to be comforted by the words. "Yeah, I guess," he said, smiling. "It will be pretty cool not having to hide anything anymore."

"Exactly," Kratos answered, deciding to focus only on the fact that his son was beginning to cheer up. "And pay no attention to anything Grimmjow says; in a few months they'll _all_ be in jail."

Lloyd laughed. "For what offense?"

Kratos shrugged. "Take your pick."


	3. I Believe in Harvey Dent

**AN: HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE! Hope you all had a great 2009 and have an even better 2010, since we've only got two more years till the world ends! Right? Yeah, I know, no one believes that shit. I do hope that you don't spend the next month hitting yourselves for putting a '0' for the year instead of a '10'. I know I'll be doing that. Stupid decades…**

**Right! Moving on! Welcome to Chapter Three! The most exciting chapter yet, or so we hope. It certainly took the longest, since we pretty much took turns passing around the scenes neither of us wanted to do. Looking over it now, though, I'm pretty pleased. **

**And please, gentle readers, don't blame us if our so far going well once a month updating system crashes come February 2nd, but we're BARELY halfway done Chapter 4 and have exams at the end of January. We'll try our best, though!**

**As a warning, LOTS of references this chapter, and we don't expect anyone to get them all, we're just really REALLY hoping that you do. Like with this entire fic, we just kind of went nuts and used all of our little obsessions, some of them more obscure than others. (Oh, and anyone who enjoys the Dr. Horrible references gets… well, nothing, but you can feel pride knowing that you're AWESOME.) Plus bonus points to anyone who catches the Brokeback Mountain reference. (;D)**

**And now for the moment I've been waiting for since we started this fic, the one disclaimer to rule them all!**

**Thingbe and I are officially really rather upset to say that we don't own Batman, A Tale of Two Cities, Final Fantasy X, Whistle!, Bleach, Fruits Basket, Katamari, James Bond, V for Vendetta, Naruto, Jack Frost, Superman, Jaws, Photoshop, The Monster Mash, Thriller, Star Wars, or The Wizard of Oz; heartbroken to admit that we don't own Full Metal Alchemist, Brad Pitt, Wikipedia, Google, Final Fantasy VII, Firefly, or Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog; Princespeach had a coughing fit when she realized she didn't and could never own The Picture of Dorian Gray, and the both of us like to pretend that we're lying when we say that we don't own Tales of Symphonia or Joss Whedon.**

**Also, we know that the title is… odd, but we actually reasoned it all out and we think it's rather deep, so if you'd like us to tell you what it means, or if you wanna guess, just leave a question in a review and we'll reply. Of course, if you have questions about anything else, feel free to ask those as well. The only thing is that we will give no answer to any questions pertaining to plot. Probably. **

**Enjoy the chapter, and happy belated Halloween!

* * *

**

Chapter 3 – I Believe in Harvey Dent

_"My momma always said life is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're gonna get." – Forrest Gump_

'_It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring_'

"Psst."

Rikku paused in her reading. A finger had poked the side of her leg, and she looked to see a hand holding a folded piece of paper. She took the note, unfolded it, and smiled upon reading what was written.

_looking forward 2 the dance 2nite ;)_

Glancing up at the front to check that Mr. Grantz (the librarian was filling in for Mr. Sohma, who had come down with a 'mysterious and sudden illness' that had _nothing_ to do with the fact that it was a half day) wasn't looking, she scribbled a reply – _me too =) can't wait to see your costume_ – before passing it back.

'_the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way_'

Another poke, and she once again was handed the note; _ur gonna b the cutest fairy there_ was written under the first two lines. Smiling wider now, she was about to start writing out her second reply when she was quickly interrupted.

"_Ahem_," came a voice from in front of her desk. Her smile fell upon the sight of Mr. Grantz, arm outstretched and that ever-present annoyed look on his face. She sighed and handed him the paper, crossing her fingers that he would let it pass. A grimace crossed his features for a second (presumably from the pair's butchering of the English language) before he simply shook his head, stuffing the note in his pocket and returning to the front desk.

She turned to smile apologetically at Shigeki, who smiled and took her hand in his own. She grinned, swinging their hands slightly in the space between their chairs and returning to her book.

'_other way - in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only._'

* * *

"Aww, c'mon, Lloyd!" The overly excited redhead begged his friend, who – despite his best efforts – was unable to ignore him.

"I'm actually _doing_ my homework for once and you're trying to distract me," Lloyd told his now pouting boyfriend. "Shouldn't you be encouraging me?"

"As your friend, Lloyd, it's my job to be a purely negative influence on your scholastic career. As your boyfriend, I'm required to be an even worse influence," he answered, smiling from his seat on Lloyd's desk while slowly leaning closer to the brunet. "I have to be sure to provide you with a bad example."

A bad example… Well, he certainly wasn't lacking there. Now that he and Zelos didn't have to hide anything anymore, they were free to explore all the wonders of public displays of affection. Zelos – as Lloyd probably should have guessed – was a master of this. After experiencing first-hand this mastery, Lloyd was thoroughly convinced that the whole school finding out about their relationship was a _good_ thing. At least, it was after those first couple days of stares, glares, and gossip. But all that was happily behind the two, and now nothing stood between them. Usually.

"Hey!" Sheena yelled from her seat next to Lloyd. She didn't have any particular problems with the boys' relationship, but that didn't mean that she was in any way willing to sit and watch them with their… affection. "Let him finish his work, you idiot. Class'll be starting soon."

The redhead smiled slyly before moving to lean over Sheena's desk. "Don't worry, Sheena. I know it must be hard to have to sit and watch me give Lloyd so much attention, but fear not! For the great Zelos Wilder has time for all his loyal hunnies!"

"Un… Unbelievable…" She muttered, sending a wide variety of death-glares to her unfortunately unaffected classmate. "Go sit down…" She grumbled irritably.

Zelos' smile widened playfully. "In Lloyd's seat?"

"_Your_ seat, you pervert."

Now the redhead stood, huffing loudly as he headed to his own desk, which was sadly _not_ next to Lloyd's. But it seemed that Lloyd was doomed to a lifetime of never finishing his homework, because the moment his pen touched paper, the door opened. Usually this would mark the beginning of the orchestra of groans and moans from the class at Mr. Hohenheim's appearance, though _today_ there was shocked silence, staring, and some suggestive whistling with shouted comments as the grade twelve boys congratulated themselves on whichever one of them picked up that lucky penny before school.

"Please tell me you're our substitute," Ikkaku said with only a little drool.

The clearly attractive woman leaned against the teacher's desk at the front of the room and smiled at them. "Mr. Hohenheim is sick today, so yes, I'll be filling in for him." She paused a moment to let the boys give their whoops of approval. "You may call me Lust."

"With pleasure," Zelos responded smoothly, Lloyd and Sheena each shaking their heads.

Lust eyed him for a moment before moving her way over to sit in the teacher's stool, cleavage overflowing as she reached for the small binder containing the attendance for the grade twelves.

"My, what welcoming young men we have here," she said to them. "Perhaps you'd like to help me with the attendance. Renji Abarai?"

"Here," he answered, raising his hand slightly.

She got around halfway down the list and paused for a second before smirking. "Envy?"

"You know I'm here, _darling sister_." There was a tinge of annoyance in his voice, and Lloyd could _hear_ the scowl.

"Envy, dear, you could be a little more welcoming," she responded, and her smirk grew slightly. Envy simply let out a loud huff, and Lust chuckled quietly for a second before continuing on with roll call. Considering the size of the class, this was over quickly. After closing the binder and crossing her arms (thus emphasizing her cleavage – were teachers _allowed_ to wear shirts like that?), she gave a sultry smile to the class. "Well then, I've been directed to give you the period to work on problems from the textbook. I'll be available to answer any questions." With that, she went to the board and wrote in neat, even writing the page and question numbers.

By twenty minutes into the period, Zelos had pulled a chair up to help _distract_ Lloyd, who was – surprisingly – again working away diligently. He had actually managed to finish the previous night's homework (though most of it was probably wrong), and had moved on to the work on the board when a shadow fell over his paper. Looking up, he saw... boobs. Lloyd promptly turned pink and looked up further, to see the ever-smirking face of the substitute teacher.

"Do you boys have any problems?"

The brunet shook his head, and out of the corner of his eye saw Zelos smirking. The redhead was going to make some sort of remark if Lloyd didn't say anything... A remark that would no doubt earn him a smack from Sheena, if her terrifying death-glare was any indication. In an effort to protect his boyfriend, Lloyd said, "Uh, n-no, we're fine, thanks..." He shifted closer into the arm Zelos had around him. It was then that Lust noticed this contact between the two, raised her eyebrow, and straightened.

"My, my, what a shame. Especially considering you're both such _attractive_ young men." With a flick of her hair and a swing of her hips, she was walking (_sashaying_) down the aisle toward the back. (Judging by a laugh from her and a shout from Envy soon after, she was tormenting her brother.)

To his side, Lloyd could hear Sheena mumbling incoherently; though judging by her previous behaviour, he was fairly certain that she had a few... _choice _words to describe the teacher. He thought he heard something that sounded suspiciously like 'prostitute' a couple of times, though that could just as well have been 'substitute'. In any case, the mixture of Sheena's grumbling and Zelos shifting closer (he was practically on Lloyd's lap by now) to whisper in his ear doomed him to another night avoiding chemistry homework.

The bell finally rang, and the grade twelves crowded out of the room as usual - though today most of the male side of the grade was almost walking backwards, wanting to keep an accurate mental picture of their best substitute _ever_. This was to be expected; what wasn't to be expected, however, was the small mass of giggling girls waiting outside the classroom door, an all-too-familiar head of pink hair at the front. _Fangirls_. Assuming they were waiting for Zelos, who was still in the classroom putting his stuff in his bag, Lloyd attempted to sneak away. It didn't take long to figure out that they were after him considering how they _swarmed_, and his efforts to escape were all in vain as they descended upon him. He was trapped.

"So, Lloyd. We were wondering..." The pink-haired girl had to trail off as she joined the chorus of giggles arising from the group. This _couldn't_ be good. "We were wondering if maybe your dad was gonna be dropping you off tonight?" And cue high-pitched giggling at twice the volume as before.

"I, uh... Wait, what?" What was going on tonight?

The mass, always a prime example of herd mentality, became confused. This was quickly replaced by high-pitched (think _dog whistle_) squealing as a familiar hand joined his, their fingers interlocking. He felt a little more relaxed with Zelos there; with any luck, his interaction with the mass would be minimal.

"Hello there, ladies. What can we do for you today?" These two simple sentences, for whatever unidentifiable reason, pleased the mass. Even more giggles resulted.

The leader spoke up again. "We were just asking Lloyd if Kratos was going to be driving him tonight."

One of the things Lloyd wished never would have come into existence was _fangirls_. No matter where he went, however, there was no avoiding them. They flocked around both his dad and his boyfriend, and therefore him. He could deal with the knowledge that they were _there_; his life would be much better if they simply stayed on the sidelines, and never made their presence known. But not only did they make their presence known, they obsessed over his _father_ of all people, even going so far as to call him by his first name. It creeped him out beyond words.

Zelos told them no (with many a flirtatious comment), and Lloyd was about to ask what the fuss was about that night when the mass turned to him again. "So then what's he doing tonight?" This one question spurred on the other members of the mass to join the interrogation. _Damn_...

About ten minutes later, after asking Lloyd every possible question about his father's personal life (most of which he avoided or refused to answer), a collaboration of Sheena's (she'd worked her way through from the edge of the mass about seven minutes in), Zelos', and his own efforts managed to shake them off through a combination of running _very_ quickly and Zelos shouting his sighting of Kratos at the other end of the hall.

"I don't see why they can't just give you some privacy," Sheena said to Lloyd once they were in the clear.

"It's not as easy as that when you've got Brad Pitt for a father," Zelos gave as a reply.

Sheena gave Zelos a look before turning to the brunet again. "You know, I can't figure out how you put up with it."

"The fangirls?" Lloyd asked, and she nodded. "Well… I wouldn't say you ever really get used to them, but you're kinda forced to live with them."

She laughed a little. "Yeah, I guess so. I suppose you can't really do anything about them going after your dad, but you could easily ditch Zelos to get a few of them off your back, couldn't you?"

"What?" Said redhead asked in surprise before laughing. "Ditch _moi_? Lloyd would never do that! He hasn't lost his soul like _some_ people."

"Then again, I suppose he is your neighbour, so you can't really escape him at home. Plus you've got the Uchihas on the other side, and I hear their fangirl following is nothing to scoff at…"

"Are you even listening to me?" Zelos complained, clearly upset that she'd missed his insult.

Before Lloyd could open his mouth to defend his boyfriend, Sheena was attacked from behind as her own boyfriend, Ling, wrapped his arms around her.

"Sheena!" He called with his usual smile. It was amazing how with just one touch, the scowl covering Sheena's face could completely vanish and be replaced by a soft, comfortable smile as she closed her eyes and leaned into the teen.

"Having a nice day?" He asked her.

"Not really…"

"Ah!" Ling said, sounding concerned but still looking happy. "Then I have good news to cheer you up! The cafeteria's serving mayonnaise shrimp today!"

Sheena's smile widened. "That sounds great, Ling."

"Yep!" He looked up then, appearing to just notice the presence of the other two. "Hey, guys! Ah, wait; Lloyd doesn't like mayonnaise shrimp, does he?"

Lloyd frowned at the younger teen's surprising knowledge of his personal tastes. "No, I don't. But I don't remember ever telling you that…"

Zelos stepped into the conversation then. "Don't be surprised, Lloyd, you're a celebrity! Everybody knows intimate details about famous people!"

"But I'm not famous…" Lloyd continued in his increasingly suspicious tone.

"Nonsense! Lloyd, you've got your own page on Wikipedia!" The redhead insisted.

"Exactly! A Wikipedia page is like an all-access pass to worldwide recognition and fame," Ling said with what surely would have been wide eyes if he ever opened them.

Lloyd felt the blush of embarrassment creep across his face as he shook his head in denial. "No, not really… I mean, who doesn't have a page on Wikipedia in this school?"

"I don't," Zelos told them. "And Ling over there's just got a stub that he shares with Greed anyways, but you, Lloyd – you've got a _page_."

"With references!" Ling added cheerily. "And a table of contents!"

"How do you people _know_ all this?" Sheena asked them.

"It came up when I searched Lloyd's name on Google," Zelos answered, earning him a confused and slightly concerned look from Lloyd.

All eyes fell to Ling to answer. "I just really like looking things up on Wikipedia," he told them before releasing Sheena from his prolonged hug. "Anyways, we should get going before Naruto eats all the shrimp."

They started to move forward, but Lloyd resisted. "Hang on, that still doesn't explain how my disliking mayonnaise shrimp ended up on Wikipedia."

The group suddenly became very focused on watching their own feet as Lloyd waited annoyed for an answer. When none came, he had to resort to other methods of detection. Outwardly none of them showed any signs of guilt, but only one of them was holding Lloyd's hand with an increasingly sweaty palm.

"Zelos?" He asked.

Surprisingly, that was all it took for the redhead to crack. "C'mon, Lloyd! Having a page on Wikipedia can be very dangerous! People can be relentless! Think of the inconsistencies that could be posted – the lies, the inaccurate information! I had to protect you from that!"

"So what did you do?"

"… I wrote the majority of your page," he admitted with a small laugh.

Lloyd was not impressed. He didn't want to think about what kinds of personal information his boyfriend had put on the Internet for all to see. He sighed heavily. "We're going to have to take a look at that page tonight…"

Zelos nodded, pleased that he wasn't upset with him. "Sure thing. We can do it right after the dance."

What had been meant as a reassuring statement suddenly backfired as the brunet was taken aback at this new and shocking information.

"That's tonight?" Lloyd cried, horrified at the prospect and bordering on mental breakdown before he felt Zelos give his hand a reassuring squeeze.

"Don't worry, Bud; you're covered, remember? We sorted that out last night."

Lloyd frowned. "We did?" Then realization came. "OH. We did, I remember now."

"Of course you do," Zelos responded, smiling and swinging their joined hands as they walked.

"We're meeting at Ichigo's house at the end of the day, right?"

Ling nodded. "Yep. Which is now, since it's a half day."

"Right!" Lloyd shouted excitedly. "So what are we waiting for? Can't we go now?"

"Without lunch?" Ling laughed at him. "Don't be silly. We're leaving _after_ we feed."

"Yeah…" Sheena started, walking slowly backwards toward one of the main doors, "I've gotta go early, the girls are meeting at Tohru's…"

"But Sheena! You'll miss lunch!" Ling protested.

She laughed at him, and waved one hand dismissively. "Don't worry. Tohru _and_ Orihime are gonna be there; I doubt I'll escape without being fed. Besides, we need a little more time to get prepared than you boys do," she finished with a small wink before hugging Ling and pecking him lightly on the cheek. "So I'll see you at the dance, okay?"

"Okaaay!"

* * *

Ichigo stared coldly at the three teenagers currently obstructing his doorway. "Go away."

The following hack took away some of the threat from his voice, but the icy glare remained the same. It was just bad luck that those in the doorway couldn't care less, 'those' being Lloyd, Zelos, and Ling.

"What do you mean?" Lloyd asked, half-confused.

"Yeah, man! We're here for the party!" Zelos announced, squeezing past Lloyd in an attempt to get inside. Ichigo proceeded to half shut the door to stop his entry. The redhead's hurt eyes met his own, and he made sure to remain unaffected, aside from a short sneeze and sniffle. "What's the deal, Ichigo?"

"Go away."

"But we need to get into costume!" Ling insisted, all three of them holding up identical-looking paper bags filled with costumes.

Just as Ichigo was going to repeat his statement, another annoying schoolmate of his appeared, this one substantially shorter and sporting an oddly-fitting cowboy hat. Envy, still only half way dressed in his costume, just _had_ to come running over when he saw the struggling newcomers.

"Hey!" He cried, wrestling and eventually winning against Ichigo for control of the door. "You're late!"

"Well _someone_ had to eat out the whole cafeteria before he'd let us leave," Lloyd explained, one thumb pointing back at Ling as the three of them headed through the now open door.

"Speaking of food, whatcha got in the kitchen, Ichigo?" The bottomless pit asked, examining their new surroundings thoughtfully.

Ichigo, however, was busy standing off to the side, inwardly fuming at the addition to his completely unplanned-for, completely un_wanted_ pre-dance party. As it turned out, the males of Centennial Academy had come to the general consensus that they would all be meeting up at his house to get dressed before the dance. Somehow throughout all of this planning, not one person had thought to tell Ichigo about any part of it. He'd been left to figure out for himself why half the guys in the school were following him home. Once he had realized what was going on, it was far too late, and of course his family had been anything but unhappy with the sudden news that Ichigo was having a sort-of-party.

His family, who seemed to have finished getting ready for the annual trick-or-treating, was coming into the room now; Karin and Yuzu were both in their angel costumes and his father in an exceedingly lame-looking Jumboman suit.

"Oh, are you hungry?" Yuzu asked eagerly. "I made some cookies, everyone's eating them upstairs."

"Hurray!" Ling cheered, clapping his hands and instantly disappearing up the staircase.

"Make yourselves at home…" Ichigo grumbled, shoving his hands in the pockets of his jeans seconds before one large red shoe collided with his face.

"Ichigo!" He heard his father yell from where he lay, coughing and hacking and plotting his counter attack. "Your wonderful daddy's taking the girls out trick-or-treating now, so feel free to have fun with your friends while we're gone!"

"You suck at parenting," Karin commented as she and Yuzu headed out the door, Yuzu stopping for a moment at the twitching form of her brother.

"You okay, Ichi?"

"He's fine," Karin assured her. "C'mon Yuzu, time for candy."

"My daughters are so cruel!" Isshin lamented rather loudly while Ichigo kicked the door shut behind them, reinserting his hands into his pockets.

"Man, your family's so cool, Ichigo," Lloyd said to him as the group headed up the stairs to the source of booming voices.

"… Yeah, okay," was all the angsting orange-head said in response, his attention less on his own sarcasm and more on their arrival upstairs. His once completely ordinary second floor hallway – with its bland walls, ceiling, floor, and sparse decorations – was filled to the brim with the sights and sounds of teenage boys. He saw that command centre to the chaos was his own bedroom (joy), but that didn't seem to be able to contain the madness as multiple articles of clothing (mostly school uniforms) lay about the place along with, as they watched, a nearly naked Naruto being thrown out of the bathroom by an unidentified arm. The group then watched as the blond listed a stream of profanities at the closed door before noticing his own lack of clothes and his audience; he promptly turned bright red and went scampering into another room.

"Oh, yeah!" Lloyd blurted, successfully dispelling the awkward moment and rooting into his bag. "Here're the suspenders you asked for, Ichigo…"

The orange-haired teen accepted them with a small nod. "Thanks."

"Suspenders?" Envy asked, scrunching his face up at the sight of them. "What are you going as?"

"Bond. James Bond."

"With orange hair…?"

"Please," Zelos began as they reached Ichigo's bedroom. "Daniel Craig's _blond_; why shouldn't the next Bond have bright orange hair? They've already abandoned all that used to make James Bond 'James Bond', dark hair included."

"That's true," Lloyd agreed. "It's sad to think about what's become of the legend. The new guy's not nearly _suave _enough."

"Actually, I kinda liked Daniel Craig…"

All three of them turned to look coldly at the avoiding-eye-contact cowboy.

"Just… no, Envy," Zelos stated, and they proceeded to turn their backs and walk away, leaving the sad little cowboy lonely but still adamant in his opinions.

"So guys, whaddaya think?" A certain spectacular-looking redhead asked the room. His audience looked him over, from his sweeping cape to his plastic-fanged smile.

"Nah," Kiba said, shaking his head. "Doesn't suit you at all."

Zelos' smile vanished in an instant. "No wants to be the other half of your stupid dog costume, Kiba."

"Well, _fine_ then!" The angered brunet huffed. "I don't need any of you losers to be the front half anyway!"

After watching in silence as their fluffy classmate stormed from the room, attention was turned back to the redhead's initial statement.

"I think it looks great!" Lloyd beamed, causing the majority of boys to roll their eyes at the typical 'Lloyd and Zelos reaction' that was taking place.

"Aw, thanks Bud!" Zelos replied, giving the pirate a squeeze. "Yours is the only opinion that really matters anyway."

"Well, I feel loved," the whiskered blond commented.

"Very," a masked V remarked from beside him.

"Whatever," Zelos continued. "What are you supposed to be anyways, Naruto?"

The blond smiled, clearly having been anticipating the question since he got in costume. "_I_ am Dr. Horrible." He paused for dramatic effect and to take out a plastic ray gun from his bag. "I've got a PhD in horribleness."

"What the hell does that mean?" Ichigo asked with only a little cough.

"From Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog!"

"And that is?"

"Only the single greatest web series to ever grace the Internet!" Lloyd answered for his friend.

Naruto nodded. "Joss Whedon's best work since the awesomeness of Firefly."

Ichigo sneezed and turned to Zelos. "You have any idea what they're talking about?"

"Mhm." He smiled. "I'm required to be interested in whatever Lloyd is."

"Alright," the teen in the suave tux said. "That explains that costume, I'm assuming Zelos is to blame for Lloyd's outfit-"

"What do you mean, 'to blame'?"

He glanced briefly from the small and fluttering vest that did little to cover Lloyd's chest and back to Zelos before continuing. "I think Ed said he was gonna be V, right?"

They all turned to the figure in black, who answered, "Veritably."

"Are you going to be doing that all night?" Naruto asked.

The masked teen didn't get to reply, however, because at that moment the door to Ichigo's usually peaceful bedroom was forced open by an overly cheerful 15-year-old... in spandex.

"What the hell is that?" Hitsugaya (dressed as a very cool Jack Frost) asked slowly.

"It's a bird!" Lloyd yelled.

"It's a plane!" Naruto continued.

"No," Zelos laughed. "It's Ling. Nice costume, man."

"Thank you!" He replied, posing dramatically in the doorway. "Sheena's gonna be my Lois Lane."

"So were the tights her idea or yours?" Hitsugaya asked, smirking from his corner as everybody laughed.

"Hey, you won't be laughing when Lex Luthor's got you captured in his evil fortress of doom and you need _someone_ who's faster than a speeding bullet to come and save you."

"Hmph. Jack Frost doesn't get captured."

"Well at least Superman lasts four seasons!"

At that the glaring contest (which Ling somehow managed to do without once opening his eyes) began, and continued throughout the Kurosaki pre-party until it was time (thankfully) to head back to school, for once in an excited and joyous fashion.

* * *

School dances were always pretty weird. It just wasn't natural, going to school when it was dark out. Not to mention all the decorations... During school hours, the front hall had been a mess of volunteer students and teachers racing around with various objects of black and orange colouring. But now the decorating was completed, and the effect was really very cool. The classics were all there; the balloon arch, the robotic monster displays that screamed as you passed them... but then there were things that even those who had been at the school for years had never seen before – like severed heads on pikes, the pictures of the school's various extra-curricular success stories replaced with images of zombies, and (Naruto's personal favourite) the Jaws music sounding from the room containing the school pool. Clearly an incredible amount of effort had been put into this year's dance.

"Hey," Naruto called to the red-headed vampire walking behind him. "Student Council did a nice job this year."

Zelos, also known as the Student Council President, smiled. "The Jaws music was my idea."

"And what about the pictures?"

"Mine as well. We got Ling to work his Photoshop magic on our little Centennial Chocobos."

"I think Tidus looks better as a zombie," Ling commented with a laugh.

"Whoa now, that sounds more like a Greed comment than a Ling one," Zelos said. "You sure you two didn't switch again and Ling's the one studying abroad?"

Ling laughed again. "Ah, well, if I was Greed I wouldn't be able to make fun of our loveable Chocobos; I'd be far too busy worrying about what Sheena was going to do to us both once she found out."

"Good point." Zelos nodded, all of them frowning a little at the subject of the banshee.

Naruto shuffled his way through the main hall towards the gym, following the various arrows on the walls and the sound of the Monster Mash that echoed through the hallways. Coming into the gymnasium for the second time that day, Naruto was just as impressed with the decorations here as he was in the main hallway. The strobe lights, glow sticks, and giant skull-shaped disco ball were definitely a nice touch. The majority of the people were crowded in the centre, dancing away to the music blasting from the front of the room. However, as with all school dances, the walls were lined with a mixture of buffet tables and chairs for the unfortunately dateless loners. He smiled to himself at the fact that he was (for once) _not_ a member of that crowd and had a perfectly adorable date waiting for him. Of course it was at this point he realized that it probably would have been a good idea to have discussed with Colette what they were going to be wearing as that would have avoided his current situation. He was looking for a costumed girl of average height in a sea of girls of average height, all of them in full costume.

Groaning to himself, he started along the path of buffet tables and loners, thinking that Colette would probably be waiting for him. It was hard to see faces in the darkness, and even harder with the costumes, but he got the general idea of who people were once he got near enough to them. The worst part was the people whose costumes were such that no matter how close you got, it was impossible to tell who it really was. Like right now, as Naruto neared a rather plain-looking ghost.

"Uh..." He started, entirely clueless as of what to say next. If it _was_ Colette, then it probably wasn't a good idea to show his uncertainty. "Hi."

"Oh! Hi, Naruto!" The apparently female ghost greeted cheerily. Cheerily enough to easily be Colette, but he still wasn't sure on the tone of the voice...

He stood there, drowning in indecision before a stroke of luck decided to visit him as the kindly ghost added, "Are you looking for Colette?"

"Orihime," he realized with a small sigh of relief. "Ah, yeah, have you seen her?"

The little ghost thought for a moment, possibly raising her hand to her chin; the large white sheet made it hard to tell. "Not since we came in, but I think she's over by the fountain of blood."

"The what, now?"

He heard the smile in her voice. "The punch bowl."

"Ah," he said, nodding. "Well, thanks..." He turned to leave, but paused before doing so. "Hey, you're not here all alone are you?"

"Well... Yeah, kinda," she said, laughing a little. "It's alright, though. I don't mind."

"What about your boyfriend? Did he…"

"Oh, he didn't really want to come. I don't think he likes dances much."

"Well, I guess I'll see you around then?" He said, unable to hide his anxiousness to leave and find his perfectly adorable date, and had he thought that already?

Sensing his anxiety, she nodded immediately to him. "Mhm. Have fun!"

He gave a little wave as dashed off along the line of tables, since he had no actual idea where the punch bowl was. Luckily this was Centennial Academy, where money was in large supply; the 'fountain of blood' wasn't that hard to find. Now that he thought about it, that was probably a more fitting title for the mammoth-sized punch bowl in front of him. Food colouring or natural flavours had dyed the liquid blood red, and it came flowing out of a snake's mouth and shooting three feet into the air before tumbling down into the enormous main bowl filled nearly to the brim with the liquid. Over-the-top things such as this were common during Centennial Academy celebrations, but Naruto still felt like shaking his head or rolling his eyes whenever he saw them. Presently, however, he was focused on the task of locating Colette. Squinting frantically in the darkness, he strained his eyes to see into all the seats surrounding the punch bowl. For some reason his night vision just refused to kick in. He was about to do something drastic (such as knock down the stupid 'fountain of blood') when he felt a gentle tap on his shoulder followed by a small giggle; a very familiar giggle, at that. Turning around, he saw something he'd never forget.

He saw an angel.

It just so happened that at that very moment, the spotlight was shining directly in their direction, illuminating the area around Colette and giving her an ethereal sort of glow. The light shone through her glittering pink wings, through her long hair and onto her simple white dress. Naruto's mouth fell open stupidly, as it seemed apt to often do around Colette.

The small girl giggled again at Naruto's expression. "Hey, Naruto."

"Colette… You…" He paused to swallow and moisten his now dry throat. "You look beautiful."

"Thanks," she said, blushing. "You look really cute too."

Normally you might think a guy would have a problem with being called 'cute', but when Colette said it, it just made his knees wobble as he struggled to stay standing.

In a moment he regained his backbone and smiled happily at her. "Do you wanna dance?"

Her only reply was a multitude of short, vigorous nods as he grabbed her hand and they ran together into the crowd of happy dancers, Thriller now blaring through the gymnasium. Neither of them were particularly skilful at dancing, and Colette nearly met the floor on several occasions, but they continued their lack of rhythmic movement until both of them were panting and holding their stomachs with laughter that had no real cause. At this point they retreated back to the sidelines and Naruto left to go and get the both of them some drinks.

Of course by now there were many people who had the same idea that they had, and the fountain of blood was barely visible through the mass of desperate boys trying to impress their female dates. With a small growl of either extreme impatience or laziness he retreated over to the nearest open door, where both light and fresh, cool air were pouring in from the hallway. He didn't realize until now that he was sweating.

"Hey, Naruto. Having fun?" He opened his eyes to find Sheena hanging off of Ling in a clearly mid dance state. The tone of her voice was oddly cheerful, and not frightening as it usually was.

"Yeah, it's pretty good this year," he answered, examining the smiling couple. Ling's outfit was easy to understand, but Sheena's glasses, neatly tied back hair and sharp-looking blazer confused him. "What are you supposed to be, Sheena? Scary boss lady?"

Happy face gone, she paused in her joyfulness to slap him upside the face.

"I'm _Lois Lane_, Naruto."

"Of course! Of course!" He said quickly while rubbing his now red cheek. "I knew that!"

He kept smiling until Ling and his wild banshee girlfriend had re-entered the crowd, just to be safe. Then he breathed a sigh of relief and shook his head as a flash of screaming pirate whooshed by him followed by a laughing redhead yelling something about wanting to 'suck Lloyd's blood' in a corny Transylvanian accent. He now saw the reason for the redhead's costume choice.

As he stood attempting to will away the unwanted images that came flooding into his mind, he got the chance to examine much of the dance. Along with multiple sightings of the bloodsucking fiend and his prey, he saw V jumping in and out of other people's conversations, and the whole school turned to look as the gang came in (thankfully through the opposite doorway). Every year they did a group costume, but there was something particularly nerve-racking this year as Darth Vader stepped out followed by his five stormtroopers. In response to the dramatic entrance, the DJ began to play the classic Empire theme music, adding to everyone's growing unease. The gang stayed as a group for the first few minutes before dispersing. One of the stormtroopers headed over to Tohru (her Princess Leia costume suddenly made a lot more sense), who was sitting relatively near to Naruto.

The smiling brunette giggled at the sight of her date. "Aren't you a little short to be a stormtrooper?"

Said trooper cocked his head at the question before pulling off his mask in response, of course revealing the face of Cloud. "I'm here to rescue you," he said, reaching out his hand.

Her smile widened as she accepted the hand. "Yay! Let's go find Ben Kenobi! He's my only hope, you know."

The two ran off into the crowd, presumably to dance, since he had seen no one dressed as Obi Wan Kenobi. This turned Naruto's attention back to the punch bowl, which was considerably less crowded, and he was about to head over there when another late arrival to the dance caught his attention.

Dressed in a very fine grey three piece suit with an old-fashioned hat and cane was undoubtedly Edward Elric carrying a small, covered picture frame in one hand. Seconds upon his arrival Naruto still couldn't say anything, but the Envy cowboy had caught sight of him and was sprinting his way over through the crowd.

"Ed!" He called, smiling, and latching on to the smartly-dressed blond, who smiled back. It took both of them another moment to notice the other blond staring dumbly at them.

"Ed?" Naruto asked cautiously. "I thought you were dressed as V tonight…"

"He was going to be," Envy answered for him. "But then some other guy bought the last one at the costume store, so he went with Dorian Gray instead."

A very deep frown set into the blond's face as he thought about this statement. Ed arrived late. Ed was Dorian Gray. Ed wasn't V. "So then who was…"

"Naruto? You okay?" Ed asked him worriedly, waving his gloved hand in front of his face, "You look like you're gonna pass out."

"Huh?" He blurted, coming out of his thoughts. "Oh, no, no, it's nothing! Great costume; I gotta get back to Colette, see you guys later!"

The other two shrugged as the possibly insane blond broke into a run away from them. Ed seemed concerned until a well-aimed lasso knotted around his chest, and he looked up to see Envy smiling wryly at him.

"Time to go, cowboy."

Naruto, in the mean time, set on a quest to find Colette and the mysterious V, who now that Ed had arrived seemed to have completely disappeared. Though he and many others would soon notice that whenever Ed went to the bathroom, the V would secretively reappear, interrupting conversations with various 'v'-filled sentences. Whoever the mysterious V was – who had been there with them at Ichigo's house, ate with them, laughed with them, and generally annoyed them – was never caught, and his identity was never discovered. It should be noted that it soon became tradition in the school to always have one student hide their identity on Halloween and dress up as V. Weeks were spent by these students to come up with cool things to say, but it was all worth it if by the end of the night, no one had guessed your true identity.

* * *

"Well, doctor, I think there's something wrong with me; my heart just started beating so much faster."

Yuan smirked playfully at his white coat-clad boyfriend, giving him an appreciative once-over (about two or three times).

"That's quite the dilemma you've got there, officer. Why don't I give you a quick check-up to see what's wrong?" The blue-haired man adjusted his police cap, complying with the suggestion and moving gracefully over to Forcystus, placing his hands on the other's waist.

"Actually, I think I know what the cause might be." As Forcystus placed his good hand on Yuan's shoulder, the latter moved forward to speak lowly in the former's ear. "I think it might be you."

"Oh? What an interesting idea."

"Isn't it? But you know, I can't allow you to simply walk around if you cause such... _effects_ in people. In fact, _doctor_, I may have to..." he paused, reaching behind to his belt and pulling off a pair of handcuffs while leaning even closer, whispering huskily now. "... Lock you up."

There was then a hand on his face, and he was turned to be eye-to-eye with Forcystus, who moved his hand to the back of Yuan's neck to pull him closer as he spoke. "Well then, if you're going to resort to such measures, I can't say I won't resist, _officer_."

With that last word, the distance between them was effectively closed and they both melted into a slow, passionate kiss.

Oh, yes. Yuan _loved_ Halloween.

This wonderful contact was broken between the two, however, when Forcystus pulled away; he made a motion with his head toward the door.

"I didn't hear the doorbell ring." If there was one thing Yuan didn't want to deal with that night (or ever), it was little children hyped up on an unhealthy amount of sugar.

"But I did. Are you going to give them the candy or should I?"

"Oh, but Forcy, I'd rather ignore them and continue from where we left off..."

"And you think sugar-hungry children'll just leave us alone, especially when we've got the front lights on?" He raised a turquoise eyebrow.

"... Touché."

"Exactly." As though to make Forcystus' point, the doorbell rang again. There was a small staring contest between the two, Yuan being the first to admit defeat; he sighed, moving towards the front door and grabbing the box of candy along the way. He heard the phone ring before he turned the doorknob, though any noise from inside the house was drowned out by the chorus of voices that greeted him from outside.

"TRICK OR TREEEEAAAAT!" The crowd of children shouted, and Yuan winced slightly; he suddenly felt very, _very_ sorry for the parents.

He gave the obligatory "Oh, what nice costumes," and "What a scary monster you are!" and so forth, handing out packets of artificially-flavoured sugar _things_.

The last child having run off after the others, he closed the door and turned back to Forcystus, ready to continue what had been so rudely interrupted. He halted once he saw the serious look on his boyfriend's face, and he frowned a little out of worry.

"Who was that on the phone?" Yuan asked, becoming more worried by the second.

"It was the precinct. Something's happened at the high school."

* * *

The upbeat song ended, quickly being replaced by something slower. Couples on the dance floor either drew closer to each other or went to get a drink and possibly find someplace to sit. Hinata took a sip from her water and picked at the edge of her Dorothy dress. Dances weren't really her 'thing'. She supposed that if she had a boyfriend, it'd be different, but as it was she felt a little awkward just standing there watching everyone. The music was nice, though... She _did_ wish she had the courage to go ask someone (a male friend, preferably) to dance, even if it was just as friends...

"Hey, Hinata."

Startled, she looked up from the ground. Through the darkness, she could make out... a lion?

"Oh, Kyo, is that... um, is that you?"

He brought his hand up to scratch the back of his neck. "Yeah, it's me. Look, uh... You kinda looked a little lonely, and I didn't bring anyone either, so did you want to...?" He motioned towards the dance floor to finish his question.

"S-sure..." She smiled nervously as they made their way to the middle of the room. After a short awkward silence, Hinata rested her hands on Kyo's shoulders, and he put his on her waist. They began to sway to the beat, the awkwardness dissolving after a time and they began to just enjoy the fact that they weren't alone.

They had begun a small conversation, and it was about halfway through the song when Hinata felt something wet on the top of her head. She stopped moving, and brought her hand to the wet spot, though she couldn't see what it was in the strange lighting.

"Hey, what's wrong?" Kyo's voice was concerned. She looked up at him, smiling reassuringly, and was about to reply when another drip landed, this time on her cheek.

"Um... Do you think we could go get a napkin? Something's... dripping on me." He nodded, and they turned to leave the dance floor, but there was a loud 'thump' behind them. Hinata turned back again, and saw... something on the floor. She couldn't see what it was completely, but it looked like... She shook her head. It couldn't be...

Others noticed it as well. There was a shout to turn on the lights, and a moment later the entire room was bathed in a fluorescent glow.

Hinata barely registered the scream that came from her mouth.

In front of them was what might have once been a normal human body. All visible skin was covered in black, blue, purple, _green_... Bruises were everywhere, varying in darkness and size, a gruesome spectrum of pain. Open gashes littered every other available surface of the skin, at some points surrounded by new bruises and going through old ones. The older cuts had become infected, and green-yellow pus leaked out from the wounds. Neither the left foot nor the right leg were anywhere to be found, and even a short glance told any that the limbs had been hacked off none too cleanly. The body's right arm was still attached by what seemed to be merely a thread, and both hands were missing various fingers. It was clear that the body was female, though her face was mangled beyond description or recognition. The students, terrified, saw the all too familiar uniform hanging in bloody tatters on the girl, and the untouched blonde hair.

Hinata shakily brought her wet fingers in front of her face.

Red.

_Blood_.

And then the world went black.

* * *

**Dun dun duuuuuuuun!**

**(THAT is why one of the genres is 'Mystery')**


	4. Chapter 5

**We're back! And we're so, so sorry.**

**So with any luck, a few of you were really looking forward to this chapter and would like an explanation as to why it's five months late (pssh, not even half a year).**

**The reason is quite simple. Chapter 4 is not of this Earth. Chapter 4 is the child of a monster. A terrifying, horrible death-monster from the pits of some dark inspiration-deprived hell. I am in no way kidding. This chapter has been re-written, scrapped, and re-scrapped so many times that it hurts my brain to remember it.**

**It got to the point where we hated it so much, that we couldn't think about it anymore. So, we decided that since Chapter 4 was such a monstrosity, we would move on to Chapter 5. Which is really Chapter 4. But at the same time, Chapter 5 is nothing like Chapter 4 since it's changed so much from the original. We're happy with it now, though, and I can't tell you the relief there is knowing that it's DONE. We decided this month that we were POSTING it come August 2nd. It's technically August 3rd... but since we haven't slept yet and it's only 5 AM, IT COUNTS. PLEASE.**

**This chapter takes place in November of 2009, so it's a little blast from the past for you. I just said blast from the past. Anyway, I think that's all you need to know.**

**Disclaimer: We really really don't own Naruto, Tales of Symphonia, Bleach, Full Metal Alchemist, Legend of Zelda, Final Fantasy VII, Romeo and Juliet, or Skype. Ah, Skype.**

**Please enjoy the chapter (which is DONE! It's finally done!).**

* * *

Chapter 4 – Chapter 5

"_Don't worry. Things will get worse." – George Skelton_

There were many things Edward Elric disliked about cold weather. The way you stopped being able to feel your ears and nose because of it, the way you had to wear layer upon layer of clothing and _still_ felt cold… not to mention that the cold made automail very, very uncomfortable. Having two metal limbs never helped with the whole 'keeping warm' thing, especially when those metal limbs were freezing to the touch; to make matters worse, they became harder to use the colder it got.

So of course Ed – being the genius he was – left the window open a crack last night and was now waking up this fine Friday morning with an achingly cold leg and shoulder, and could feel the beginnings of a headache forming. The alarm clock blaring in his ear might've been contributing to that.

Looking up at the window, he swore. _"Verdammt…"_ Outside, scattered flakes of snow were lazily drifting to the ground, no doubt foretelling a particularly cold and unforgiving winter. Not to mention a bad day full of achy limbs… He sighed as he closed the window, then grabbed his uniform and headed for the bathroom.

One refreshingly warm shower later and Ed was walking down the stairs. He took his time, still trying to get used to the feeling of being awake.

"_Ah! Guten Morgen, Ed! Ist Vati in der Küche?"_

He looked up; Al was just leaving his room, smiling as he usually was in the mornings. Ed never really understood how he did it, but then again, it was Al. That kid was always cheerful.

"_I think so."_ Even since moving here, they hadn't gotten out of the habit of speaking German at home. Granted, it was _much_ easier to speak one's native language in the morning. Ed waited for his brother at the end of the stairs, and they entered the kitchen.

Once they entered the room, Ed looked around. Their dad was sitting at the table with a newspaper and coffee, as expected. There might be some leftovers from last night that could make a good cold breakfast, but maybe not. He knew that they were out of bread... He was not, under _any_ circumstances, having milk with his breakfast (or any meal, really). Therefore, cereal was completely out of the question, and he shuddered a little as he watched Al prepare a bowl. Left with little choice, he began his semi-routine search of all the kitchen cupboards before coming across one of the most glorious of breakfast foods: _muffins_. If it were any other time of day he'd be sporting a very pleased smile as he took the first bite; however, it was too early to be smiling about much of anything right now. He got a glass of juice and sat down at the wooden table.

"_A muffin again?"_ Hohenheim asked with a short glance away from the paper.

"_Cereal involves milk."_

After many years of dealing with Ed and his profound hatred of milk, Hohenheim knew to drop that line of conversation; there was nothing that could get the teen to drink milk, and any conversation involving it would end badly.

It was after a short silence that Al piped up. _"Dad, can I go to Genis' tomorrow? We have a project to work on."_

"_Yes, that's fine,"_ Hohenheim replied, and the silence continued. Ed had finished his muffin, and had started to zone out, looking outside and watching the snow as it slowly stopped falling.

Mornings were usually a quiet affair, as Al was the only real 'morning person' of the three of them. It was mostly a comfortable silence that they sat in from day to day, barring the few times there was an argument; these were almost always caused by Ed being grumpy, however, and the other two had more or less gotten used to his morning moods.

"_Do you have any plans for the weekend, Ed?"_ It was very like Al to still try and start a conversation going in the mornings.

Ed looked away from the window. _"Not really… I'll probably do something with Envy, and his birthday's coming up, so I have to get him a present…"_ He could see Al was making a conscious effort to stay cheerful and interested; the topic of Envy had become somewhat delicate among the two brothers. It may have had to do with the idea that Envy might be possibly considered a criminal in some circles, or that he had made Ed's life miserable in elementary school, but either way the fact stood: Al did not like his brother's boyfriend.

Ten minutes later, they had all finished their breakfasts and were preparing to leave for school. Teeth were brushed, bags were packed, and the only thing left was the only real problem with the morning.

The car.

This wasn't any car; no, it was old, dying, and had seen who knew how many crashes. It was impossible by now to tell the brand, and how it was still allowed to be on the road baffled many. Despite this, it was Hohenheim's beloved car, and no matter how much his sons told him it was going to kill them all one day, he would only say goodbye when all the doors were missing and the back seats with them. There was always a scramble between Ed and Al to be the one to sit in the passenger seat at the front as the seatbelt was a little less frayed than those at the back, and the seat itself was slightly more attached to the car.

As it was, Ed lost the battle this morning, and was left to cling for dear life to anything around him that would provide more security than the threadbare seatbelt.

The moment they left the driveway, his headache (that had more or less faded away) came back full force.

* * *

Envy's morning had started the way it usually did. He woke up, got ready for school in record time, grabbed some fruit on his way out the door, and hitched a ride in the big white van the gang 'owned' and liked to call Dave. He was right on time with his regular schedule – that is, until Yumichika decided that he would take forever to get ready. It could get pretty hard to remember why they kept that guy around… Whatever the reason, it was beyond Envy. In short, because of Yumichika's struggles to style his hair _just right_, they all arrived at the school later than they usually did. Which of course wasn't a problem for everybody else, but Envy had a grouchy boyfriend waiting for him. Maybe if he hoped hard enough, Ed wouldn't be in _that_ bad a mood…

"You're late today," the blond stated without looking away from what he was doing at his locker. Envy winced a little. So maybe his hopes had been in vain after all.

"Yeah, a couple of the guys took a bit too long this morning… Apparently you have to look pretty even when you're in a gang." Uh oh. That got Ed to look at him, but it was a _look_. It only lasted for a second, but he was still left wondering what he'd done to earn it. He tried starting a conversation to distract his boyfriend from being miserable. "So, uh, how're your classes going?"

"Fine." Ed shut his locker with a little too much force, causing a passing niner to jump away in fright. "The only really interesting subject is physics; biology would be, too, if the grade eleven course weren't a complete joke. English and music are a general waste of time as per usual." He leaned against his locker, facing Envy.

This gave the older teen an idea. "Those two are your morning classes, right?"

Great, Ed looked suspicious. "Yeah," he said slowly.

"Then let's skip and go do something!"

Okay, that was obviously _not_ the right thing to say. At all. Envy prepared for his doom as the blond scowled up at him. "You know you shouldn't skip any more classes. Especially the morning; you have math and chemistry, right?"

"Well, yeah, but since when do they matter?"

"When have they not mattered? You're in grade twelve; if there's ever been a good time for you to start worrying about your grades, it's now."

"I don't see why you're getting so worked up over this." They'd had this conversation before. Many times, in fact, and it never ended well. It never failed to put the both of them in bad moods. And then there was the fact that Ed hadn't gotten over his morning crankiness yet – that couldn't be helping things any.

"Because you aren't! You need to grow up and realize that high school isn't just fun and being a teenager; you have to work, too!"

Okay, that was it. Whatever it was that was getting Ed so riled up didn't matter anymore; he'd pushed it too far, and somebody (most likely Envy) was going to say something they'd later regret.

"You're telling me that _I_ have to grow up? At least I'm an average height."

Maybe this was what people meant when they suggested that he think things through before saying them.

Ed gave him the most piercing – and frightening – glare he'd ever been on the receiving end of, and Envy was sure they would've started yelling very soon if the bell hadn't decided to be very convenient that day. There was one final angry stare between them before the grade eleven turned around to head to class. Perfect, there was his morning ruined. He decided to go to class too; there wasn't much else to do, and it wasn't like he could have any fun in such an awful mood.

* * *

Anyone who has ever been in a relationship knows that those first few days when everything between the two of you is fresh and new, when every good thing the other does is a complete and wonderful surprise... well, there's nothing quite like it. Naruto Uzumaki, however, never had been in a relationship before. He was never told of new relationship bliss. All he knew was that, suddenly, everything was just a little bit brighter. School was less painful, Sasuke a little less maddening... heck, even the brutal murder of his peer couldn't keep his spirits down.

If only Iruka would feel the same way when he brought home the failing grade (which really didn't bother him at all) that was scratched in red at the top of his test paper. Math was never one of his strong points, but luckily in Mr. Sephiroth's class, it became no one's strong point. The only thing that made the grade tens more depressed than a test day (which they were _lucky_ enough to get every other Friday), was a getting tests back day.

"And lastly, Ling Yao," the root of all evil – also sometimes referred to as Mr. Sephiroth – called.

Ling made his way through the cluster of desks at slightly-faster-than-crawl speed, and tried not to look at the frightening teacher until the very last moment. The actual exchange of the test happened in silence; Mr. Sephiroth held out the package of stapled papers, facing down so that the mark couldn't be seen, and Ling took it from him. There seemed to be one moment where the teen was unsure of whether or not he could just go back to his seat and never flip the paper over at all, thereby saving himself from the horror. But curiosity got the best of him and one swift twist of the wrist brought the circled percentage into his field of view.

Suddenly, he started to laugh. It was a breathless, empty laugh, but a laugh all the same and it was something unheard of for that particular classroom. All of the students looked up to stare and, even worse, the teacher.

"Do you really think that mark to be a laughing matter, Mr. Yao?" Came the cold and heatless remark of the educator.

Ling stifled his laugh, but his smile still somewhat remained on his face as he answered, "Oh, no Sir, but it's either laugh or cry at this point, and depression really isn't fun for anybody."

With that the sound of the bell rang through the speakers, and suddenly no one really cared about what was going to happen next; second period was over, lunch had officially begun, and they could finally leave math. First one out of the door was Naruto, followed closely by Kiba and with Tatsuki coming in third. The lunch-hour rush had begun.

Today, however, was a thousand times better than all of the previous lunches Naruto had experienced, because this time he wasn't going to hang around with a bunch of losers who would no doubt try and make fun of him... He was gonna go eat lunch with a girl. _His_ girl. 'Cause he had a girlfriend. _Damn_ was he ever cool. They were meeting at a certain bench that sat below a large, arched window that looked out onto a small patch of grass with some trees and flowers and such. It was too cold to go outside so they were going to eat the lunch (which Colette had insisted on bringing) right there on the bench. As it was, he only rammed into a few people on his stampede through the hallways, so within a minute – maybe two – he found himself near the front of the school, in front of the little bench. A quick glance told him that Colette wasn't there yet. Another told him that she _really_ wasn't there yet, and a third told him that he needed to calm down, or run the risk of losing his cool. So, he took a seat on the bench (mostly so that no one else would take it) and attempted to wait patiently.

Realizing that she might be a few minutes late (or a few minutes less early than he was), he slumped with a sigh, having completely given up on the whole 'patience' thing, and silently debated whether or not to tie his tie, which currently hung uselessly around his neck. In the end, he gave in and made an attempt to straighten the thing out. He'd just created an interesting-looking knot when he spotted the blonde girl coming down the hall.

"Colette!" He yelled, standing. She turned, smiled, and both ran towards each other. Just as they met Colette (typically) caught her foot on something and came tumbling forward, into Naruto's arms. He caught her by the elbows, and, after a moment, started to laugh.

"Oh, I'm so sorry!" She told him, and Naruto saw the worry in her big blue eyes as one of the most adorable things he'd ever seen in life.

"What are you sorry for? I caught you, didn't I?" He asked, still smiling.

"Yes, you did." Colette giggled. "Are you hungry?" She glanced downward at the overstuffed brown paper bag she held clutched in one hand. Naruto nodded and the two returned to the bench.

"So..." Naruto began, one hand going to rub the back of his head, "How was your morning?"

"It was good. We learned the Song of Storms in music."

"The Song of Storms? That sounds... exciting, I suppose."

"Mhm. I wasn't very good at it, but it was really nice listening to Link and the teacher play it."

Presently she reached into the paper bag and started to bring out her prepared lunch. He was glad she hadn't let him just bring instant ramen. Sandwiches, juice, apple slices, even cupcakes – it looked delicious.

"Colette, this is awesome!" He exclaimed, immediately throwing an apple slice into his mouth. "You're amazing!"

She blushed slightly. "I'm glad you like it, Naruto."

"I'd like anything you've made," he blurted. "I-I mean, y'know, cause everything you make tastes so good – not that I've really had anything else you've made before or anything, I just-"

"No, it's sweet," Colette told him gently. "Thank you."

Now he was the one blushing. "I... uh..." He started, closing his eyes for a moment before continuing. "I'm really happy to have met you, Colette. I really like you."

She chewed a bite of her sandwich slowly, looking at him through her bangs. "I really like you too, Naruto. And I'm glad that you asked me to the dance. No matter how things turned out, I'm really glad that I have this chance to be here, now, with... Zelos!"

"_Zelos_?" Naruto repeated flatly, staring as Colette jumped out of her seat to stand and wave at something behind him. He might've turned around to see what that something was, but after a moment, the something was clinging onto his shoulders, and the something's bright red hair was tickling the back of his neck.

"Zelos."

"Hi, Zelos!" Colette cheered at his... _unexpected_ arrival.

"Hello, my two favourite little lovebirds! Enjoying your lunch?"

"Mhm! Would you like some?"

"Well, normally I wouldn't, but when it's offered to me by such a beautiful girl, I simply _must_ say yes."

With that his hand snaked around, heading for the apple slices. And right there was when he crossed the line, and Naruto's eyes narrowed.

"What are you doing?" He asked, clearly annoyed, while he shooed away the redhead's hand and turned his torso to face him.

Zelos looked at him with innocent eyes. "Doing? Nothing. I was just having some apples."

"Right. You were 'just having' some of the apples that _my_ girlfriend happened to bring for _us_."

A very sly smile spread across Zelos' face then, but it was Colette who spoke next.

"Naruto, it's really alright, there's plenty of food and everything..."

"No, no, no!" Zelos told her, moving over towards Colette as he did so. "It's fine." He lifted his leg and sat down directly behind Colette, placing his hands down on her shoulders.

Naruto could feel his face getting red with anger, he couldn't stand watching him act like that with Colette. _His_ Colette.

"What are you doing?" He asked again, "Get off of her!"

Zelos raised his eyebrows in a feigned innocence. "Hmm? What are you talking about? I'm not doing anything, am I Colette?" He finished with a hug to the blonde.

Naruto was about ready to kill at this point when Colette reacted by frowning and pulling Zelos' arms away gently.

"Zelos, you really shouldn't do that sort of thing anymore."

Zelos nodded, smiling quite happily. The damage was done.

"_Anymore?_" Naruto practically hissed. "What do you mean 'anymore'?"

"Oh, did Colette never tell you?" Zelos said to him in mock surprise.

"Tell me _what_?"

Colette frowned again as she answered, "Well, Naruto, Zelos was actually my, um, boyfriend for a... a while."

Naruto stared at them. "You actually went out with _him_?"

"I thought I'd told you about that!" She continued. "And we only went out for, what was it, a year, or-"

"Two years," Zelos interjected.

"Two years then. See? Not that long."

"Two _years_?" Naruto repeated.

Zelos smiled. "It was really sweet, actually, how we met. It all started during that school play in grade eight… well, I guess you were in grade 6, but whatever. Do you remember it? _Romeo and Juliet_..."

Naruto continued to stare. "What the hell did you see in him?"

The redhead pouted a little. "C'mon, Naruto, I'm not that bad, am I?"

"Oh, no! No! Apparently you're amazing!" The blond was standing now for his rant. "First Lloyd, and now Colette-"

"Technically, it was Colette first and then Lloyd-"

"Whatever! How is it that all of my friends just _happen_ to have gone out with you? What the hell is that about?"

Zelos shrugged. "You must hang out with really attractive people?"

Naruto went back to staring at him. Eventually, though, Colette spoke up.

"Naruto, it's alright." She stood up and clasped his hands in her own. "It's just like I told you before; I'm here now with you, and I'm happy. I really like you."

Naruto had no response; he just looked at this girl, the girl he'd dreamt about for years, the girl that was every bit more amazing in everything that she did than he could imagine. She just kept surprising him. Suddenly an entirely unwanted hand thudded onto his shoulder, "See? No need to be jealous or anything, right Whiskers?"

"I wasn't jealous," Naruto growled, then turned quickly to Colette. "Why? Should I be?"

Colette shook her head, and Zelos laughed at him. "It's alright, man. It's alright."

With that the redhead picked his bag and slung it over one shoulder, much to Naruto's happiness.

"You're leaving?" The blond asked him excitedly.

"Of course," he responded. "I've got to get to class."

"Now?"

"Lunch's over, Naruto."

Just as the red head then turned and walked away, the shrill ringing of the bell filled the blond's ears. Lunch was over.

Colette sat down again. "We didn't get to finish the food."

"I- I'm sorry," Naruto began, helping her return everything to the bag. "I guess I got distracted."

"Oh no, it's fine!" She assured him. "I can bring it all again on Monday, if you'd like."

Naruto started to nod in agreement until another thought crossed his mind. "Well, why don't we just finish it today? We could continue right where we left off after school."

Colette smiled. "That sounds great!"

"Yeah, we could go to the park or something!"

"Um, it's snowing outside..."

"Or the mall. We can go to the mall and have a picnic!"

Colette giggled. "That sounds perfect. We can eat in front of the fountain."

"Yeah!" Naruto agreed, and the two of them, having finished packing up, stood awkwardly for a moment, unsure of what to do next.

"So, I guess we should get to class," Colette said quietly, fiddling with the sleeve of her cardigan.

Naruto nodded. "Yeah..." He took a step backward, hesitated, and then came forward quickly, wrapping his arms around Colette. She was surprised, and it only lasted a few moments, but it was long enough for her to hug back, and the two of them parted ways with a small smile.

* * *

Ed kind of hated the end of the school day. Sure, it was nice to be done with the work and everything, but then there was the noise, the pushing, the running... it was all the chaos of lunch tenfold. Plus when he thought about it, he sort of liked the work. When he was in school, he was in his element. Having the best grades in his class was rather pleasant. Even biology, the class he'd just left, was enjoyable. Enjoyable, but not entirely _normal_. After all, it was being taught by the lunatic with a weird paedophilic thing for little boys. For _some reason_, Mr. Orochimaru seemed to count Ed under the title of 'little boy'. Ed didn't particularly _like_ Mr. Orochimaru.

"Here," came a sudden voice to his left. He looked to see his classmate, Hitsugaya Toshiro, holding out the pages of notes Ed had lent him.

"Thanks for letting me borrow them," the white-haired boy added as the other filed the notes into the stack of textbooks he carried under one arm. Ed nodded.

"No problem. You get everything alright?"

"Mhm."

There wasn't much to say, but there never really was with Hitsugaya. The two of them walked side by side through the hallways as they usually did, more for convenience than anything else – not only were they both headed to the school's parking lot, but they seemed to be the only two who were actually _walking_ through the hallways. The only difference was that Hitsugaya was headed to his very own incredibly drool-worthy car, and Ed was headed to the run-down scrap heap that somehow functioned as the Elric-mobile.

Ahead of them there was a small crowd of students circled around a window. Normally Ed wouldn't have cared what they were looking at, but as it happened a few of the students walked away as Ed passed, and he caught a glimpse of what they had gathered around. It was a crappy school desk, covered with a cloth and a variety of flowers. In the middle of the flowers was a picture of Ino. The students crowded around were paying their respects. Ed stopped then, and took a place in the crowd for a minute. Hitsugaya did the same.

"Did you know her?" He asked the blond.

Ed shook his head. "Not really. Did you?"

"No."

All around the desk were other things – pictures, notes, more flowers… People were saying goodbye to their friend, their classmate, their schoolmate, or – as in Ed and Hitsugaya's case – the complete stranger. They didn't stay there long, it was too awkward. Some people were crying, while others were just staring into space. A pink-haired girl was kneeling on the floor, weeping. It was like a funeral or something, and more than anything it made Ed want to get out of there, to go home with his father and his brother.

When they reached the parking lot, Ed still watched scornfully as his classmate turned to his own car, the keys tinkling as he dug them out of his pocket.

"See ya." He waved, and Hitsugaya just nodded in acknowledgement.

Ed frowned and tried to shake it off, but the happenings of the day must have left some expression on his face, because when he reached the car, Hohenheim looked concerned. Weird. Usually Hohenheim was last to the car. He figured he made himself late getting caught up in the hallway back there.

"Sorry I'm late," he said, and left it at that when he couldn't think of a good excuse. "Were you guys waiting long?"

"No, I just got here myself," he answered, then looked Ed in the eye and asked, "Did Al say he was going to be late too?"

Ed threw his bag and textbooks into the front seat before answering.

"I don't think so," he replied, frowning now; Al wasn't usually late. Actually, he wasn't ever late. It was rare for him not to be the first to the car, but he wasn't there today. "It's weird that he's not here yet, though."

"Did you talk to him at all today?"

Ed shook his head, thinking now if he'd seen his brother at all since the morning. He hadn't. Not even when he'd stopped at the shrine. If Al had been there, he would have noticed; he was sure of it.

"I haven't seen him at all since this morning," he said to his father, whose forehead only grew more creased with worry. Ed sighed and leaned next to him against the car. "I'm sure it's nothing though, I don't usually see Al anyway. He's probably helping some niner out with his math homework or something. He'll be out in a minute."

Hohenheim just nodded.

It was cold, and the sky looked like it was likely to snow again, so they waited inside the car. Not that it did much in the way of warmth; Ed couldn't remember the last time the heating had worked. Five minutes later and his shoulder and hip were starting to ache from the cold, and he pulled a pair of red gloves out of his backpack. Hohenheim wasn't saying anything; he was just staring out at the school with a frown on his face. Now, though, he turned to look at Ed, who got the message pretty clearly.

Sighing again, he opened the door and clambered out of the car.

"I'll go and find him."

The cold was worse outside with the wind blowing into his face and numbing his nose. Inside there were a lot less people, but there were still enough to make finding one person be a pain – especially with the uniforms. Although, Al was probably one of the only people left in school with their tie on straight. He headed off to Al's last period, which was German with Ms. Armstrong. All the while his eyes scanned for his brother, but he couldn't see him, and the halls were getting more and more empty as time went by. What he did see, however, was that little silver-haired kid named Genis who was in grade ten, but happened to be Al's best friend all the same.

"Hey!" He called out to the boy, who was just closing up his locker.

"Hi..." Genis said to him, clearly confused. It wasn't like Ed usually bothered to speak with his brother's friends. Especially _Genis._

"I'm looking for Al, have you seen him?"

Genis shook his head, "Nope. Not since this morning. He didn't meet me for lunch either, I figured he must've gone home."

"Oh. Never mind then," he mumbled, frowning to himself.

Genis flung his oversized bag over his shoulders and started to walk away.

"Did you try texting him? Maybe he's staying late for something."

Ed said nothing, but pulled his phone from his pocket as the grade ten walked off. He didn't have any new texts, and it was hardly likely that Al would have his phone turned on while he was in school, but he figured that maybe the universe was folding into itself and Al was skipping class for the first time in his life; hell, maybe he found a girl. He clicked the speed dial and held the phone up to his ear. On second thought, there was no way Al was with a girl. Or a guy, for that matter.

A second later and he got the answering machine. So the phone wasn't even turned on. Not surprising, it probably meant that he was staying late in class. Though how anyone could stand to stay late with a teacher like Ms. Armstrong, Ed didn't really want to know.

"Mr. Elric," the tall blonde woman said, inches in front of where Ed stood just inside the open door to the school's Foreign Language classroom. Most teachers sat at their desks and did paperwork once school ended; Ms. Armstrong seemed to be one of the few who chose to walk around inspecting the desks and waiting for a passerby to pounce on.

"Well?" She asked him impatiently. "What is it that you want?"

"I was just wondering if Alphonse was staying late in your class today."

She made a wide sweeping gesture with one of her arms. "Do you see Alphonse in my class?"

"Well, no, but-"

"Do you see any indication of Alphonse's possible presence in my classroom?"

Ed stared at her, very quickly losing his patience. "No."

"Then why are you wasting my time?" She finished, turning around and moving towards the front of the room.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to bother you," he said to her, starting to turn around again before she continued.

"Leave the stupid questions to stupid people, Mr. Elric," she said as she settled herself into the teachers chair, looking at him. "People can't stay late for a class they never attended."

"You mean Al didn't come to fourth period at all?"

"That is correct, Mr. Elric."

That was just... strange. "Thanks, Ms. Armstrong."

"You're welcome, Mr. Elric. See you next semester."

Ed cringed a little at the last part, but didn't have too much time to think about it as he headed back outside quicker than he'd come in. Something didn't feel right. Al never skipped class, he hardly even allowed for sick days. He wasn't at the car, and Genis said he'd been missing since at least lunch... There, that was it. Missing. Al was really missing. His eyes darted to the side a moment before he could stop them. Flickering for just a second to the framed picture on that little run-down desk...

Hohenheim met him halfway in the parking lot, concern clearly eminent on his features, and his voice held that serious, fatherly tone that was reserved for situations that Ed didn't like to think about.

"He wasn't in the school?"

"Not that I could see. Ms. Armstrong said that he didn't show up for fourth, and Genis said that he's been... well, that he hasn't seen him since this morning either, not even at lunch."

Hohenheim nodded slowly before walking towards the building, checking to make sure that his son was following him.

"Where are we going?" Ed asked.

"To the office."

"Shouldn't we maybe..." The younger blond paused for a moment, unsure of whether or not to continue. "Shouldn't we call the police or something?"

"We will. But I want to make sure he's not in the building first, so I'm going to make an announcement in the office. Then we'll call."

Ed just nodded. The tension was building now, and a knot was forming in his stomach. If there was one thing that Edward Elric hated, it was not knowing. They reached the office quickly, and Ed was suddenly thankful that his father was a teacher. He wasn't sure if this had ever happened before, but it was nice to be able to stand back and let his dad do all the talking. After all, he had a better rapport with the office staff than a student ever could.

As the two approached the small desk, the blonde head of Ms. Hawkeye (the school's main secretary) looked up from her computer to see them.

"Good afternoon, Ms. Hawkeye," Ed's father started pleasantly enough. "Could you please make an announcement for us?"

"Of course." She nodded, and the two followed over to stand by the little black microphone. She flipped a couple of switches before looking back to Hohenheim expectantly.

"I'd like you to call Alphonse down to the office, please. We're having some trouble locating him."

Her eyes widened a little in concern, but she made no comment other than a brief nod before clicking the little button on the microphone and making the announcement.

Once that was over with, Hohenheim turned back to his son.

"Should we call the police now?" Ed asked uncertainly.

Hohenheim shook his head. "In a minute; we'll just give him a chance to hear the announcement before we do."

A sound plan, and the three of them returned uselessly to Ms. Hawkeye's desk to wait. Ed started to fiddle with his phone, initially to check for any messages from Al, but flipping it open and closed quickly became something for his hands to occupy themselves with. By now the school was basically empty; not even groups for after-school activities were present in the halls or classrooms. Hohenheim had just finished explaining the situation to Hawkeye.

She took it all in with the same straight face. She was always acting with that weird sort of military precision.

"I understand," she said, standing from her swivelling desk chair. "It would probably be best to alert the police now, and in the meantime I'll go and tell Vice Principal Mustang about the situation."

"Thank you," Hohenheim said quickly while grabbing the receiver of one of the many school phones present in the office.

"Could I have the Police Department please?" His father answered someone that Ed couldn't hear. "Yes, hello, my name is Van Hohenheim; my son has gone missing from school. ... No, three 'h's, I'm his father. ... Alphonse Elric, he's 14, in Grade 9. ... Not since this morning when we came to school. ... Yes, I'm there now. I'm a teacher here. ... Centennial Academy, the private school? It's just down on- ... Yes, that's the one. ... Alright, thank you, sir."

The older man put the phone gently back into its cradle, that stern expression even more prominent on his face. After a time one of the inner doors of the office opened, revealing the even sterner face of Vice Principal Mustang followed by Ms. Hawkeye. Being the child of a teacher, Ed had spent more than the usual amount of time with the members of staff, and he knew them better than most. Most people agreed that the VP was better than the Principal, Mr. Bradley, but he was still an overly-strict and bitter womanizer. Mustang was consistently focused less on the good of the school and more on how to usurp Bradley from his position. He was another one of those many people that Ed didn't really like, only in this case the feeling was mutual.

"You called the police?" The dark-haired man asked upon entering.

Hohenheim nodded. "They're sending someone down."

"Excellent. In the meantime we can try and identify exactly what time he went missing by checking the attendance records for today."

Now he took to following Hawkeye, who had moved to the computer sitting on her desk.

"You said he's in Grade Nine?" She asked.

It was Ed who answered. "Yeah, Grade Nine. I know that he was absent for fourth period."

She nodded, eyes scanning the monitor while her finger clicked on the mouse a few times. "He wasn't there for third either."

"Genis said he wasn't there for lunch," Ed added, then after a look from Mustang, elaborated. "Genis Sage is his best friend; he would have told him if he wasn't going to be there."

"He was present for second period," Hawkeye concluded with a final click. "So whatever happened to him probably happened over lunch."

Mustang crossed his arms and nodded to her. "Good. Well, now we at least have something to tell the officer when he arrives."

"Which should be any minute now," Hawkeye added in an almost comforting tone.

Ed said nothing, and Hohenheim just nodded slowly.

As it turned out, Hawkeye was wrong. Half an hour passed and still no one had shown up, and by that time Ed had finally given up and sat himself down on the uncomfortable little couch and brought his phone back out in defeat while his father continued his silent attempt at the world's longest pace-a-thon.

For a moment, he thought about calling Envy. Instantly thoughts of what had happened this morning (though it felt like so much longer ago) kept popping up in his head. Still, it felt like this was something bigger than that, and he knew that Envy wouldn't hold it against him if Ed needed him right now. It was more other things that kept Ed flipping his phone open and closed rather than dialling a number. He wasn't sure if it was okay for him to call Envy there in the dead silence of the office. Even texting felt like it would be awkward. Besides, what would he say? _Hey Envy, my brother's missing. Don't worry, though, everything's fine! _Anything Ed said was just going to get him worrying, and he didn't want that. There was nothing Envy could really do anyways, except be there, suffering through it just like Ed was. It was better this way.

... He really wished that Envy could be there.

Just then Hohenheim stood still, and Hawkeye (who had been eying the window periodically this whole time) spoke up.

"Looks like they're here."

"Finally," Mustang commented, then turned to Hawkeye. "Could you-"

"I'll make sure he finds his way in."

She headed out the door briskly and everyone stared after her. Ed stayed seated and took his time returning his phone to his pocket. When he stood up, Hohenheim made a move as though he were about to follow the young office worker, but the door was already swinging open again, first revealing Hawkeye and then a tall man with beady little eyes and bleached blond hair slicked back over his angular face.

"Hello, then. Apologies for being late, I was held back by a few things," the man drawled, taking off a pair of black leather gloves before looking up at them. "My name is Detective Kvar."

"I'm sorry, are we boring you?" Ed snapped at the man's nonchalant tone. "There someplace you'd rather be?"

It seemed to take him some effort to lower his gaze down to the younger blond and answer, "Did you say something?"

"What kind of a police officer takes this long to respond? It's what, ten minutes from there to here on _bus_? You expect us to trust you with our lives when you can't beat the public transit?" Ed continued, fuming just a little. "I hate to be stereotypical but the only real distractions would've been the Laundromat and the donut shop, so unless you had an urgent situation involving dirty socks-"

"That's enough, Edward," Hohenheim told him, a large hand resting on his shoulder. Ed resigned and stopped talking, but he didn't stop glaring. He was glad to see that his father was giving a less than pleasant look himself. Detective Kvar was doing a good job of making as few friends as possible in the first five minutes. Despite that, though, he was necessary. If he could help them find Al, then it was worth it to put up with the prick.

"We're glad to have you here, Detective," he heard his father say.

Mr. Mustang was next to step forward with an outstretched hand that the Detective simply stared at for a moment before ignoring, but the vice principal was quick to recover without the handshake; "It's good to meet you; I'm Roy Mustang, the Vice Principal here, and I just wanted to assure you that we're ready to provide anything you might need."

The man responded, "Well then, you'd better get started filling me in. Tell me everything you know and I'll try to make some sense out of it."

He was demeaning. He was disrespectful. It was steeped into every syllable of what the Detective said, and everyone there knew it. With Ed's previous rage boiling down to a deeply menacing simmer of hatred, the blond was being pressured into silence again. Pushed into the background while those older than him explained the situation, again. He was useless, again. The most he could do was yell at the damn cop. The cop who was now their best shot at finding Al. At this point the three members of staff were nearly finished relaying the information while Kvar sat leisurely in a chair and gave them an unmistakeably uninterested expression. At the very least, things couldn't get any worse.

"From the sounds of it the situation resembles one we encountered just recently," the man started, crossing his legs and leaning back in his chair.

"Are you familiar with a student by the name of Ino Yamanaka?"

* * *

**Greed Yao **is online

**Ling Yao** Wow! We're both online! 4:05 PM

**Greed Yao ** Whoa, that's amazing. You got time to call? 4:06 PM

**Ling Yao** Yeah, of course! 4:06 PM

Call from **Greed Yao** 4:07 PM

/ / /

"So how's life abroad?" Ling set his twin to full-screen.

"The usual. What's going on over there? That girlfriend of yours dump you yet?"

"Nope! Sheena and I are doing great!" His reply – much like most of the things he said – was accompanied by his trademark grin.

The pixellated image of his brother scoffed. "She'll realize her mistake of picking your dorkiness over my sexy manliness once I get back."

"... Greed, we're twins. _Identical_ twins."

"Pfft, like that changes anything. You know I got all the good genes."

Ling sighed, shaking his head slightly. "Yeah, of course." He hefted up his math and science textbooks from his backpack before again braving the depths to fish out his agenda. Upon his very first glance at the massive list for the day's homework, the procrastinator in him began pleading to ignore it all and go get some food. His stomach grumbled in agreement. "You know, teachers could stand to give us a little break around midterms…"

"I know, eh? Even here, they all assign as much homework as they can! Not that I really do all of it, but I have to do more than usual 'cause you're not around…"

"And it's not gonna change once you get back. I'm not doing your homework this year." Ling gave what he hoped was a stern look in the general direction of his webcam.

"You keep telling yourself that." Sometimes, he could forget how irritating it could be to talk to his brother; every time he remembered, he wondered at how he had ever managed to forget in the first place. He was about to give some sort of scathing reply when his door flew open (he worried about the impact of the doorknob on the wall), and a far more irritating sibling ran in.

"Hey Ling, there's cookies downstairs! Oh! Are you talking to Greed? I wanna talk to Greed! Hi, Greed! How are-"

"Thank you, Mei, now _leave_," Ling said after covering her mouth with one hand. The little girl scowled and pulled his hand away.

"But I wanna talk to Greed!" Adding a whiny tone to her voice _really_ wasn't winning her any points.

"That's nice. You can talk to him some other time." A thought occurred to him and he added, "If you leave, I'll show you how to talk to him on your computer later, okay?"

As though deep in thought, she stood pouting at him. It became something of an endurance match as the two siblings half-glared at each other; she never was one to leave either of her brothers alone. One of her favourite things to do was to bother them relentlessly ending only when the unfortunate twin of the moment (which had defaulted to Ling ever since Greed left, the lucky bastard) resorted to threats, or (more rarely) there was a compromise worked out. If she kept this up any longer, it looked like threats were going to be in order...

"I'll go if you agree to clean Xiao Mei's litter tonight." She crossed her arms, pulling a frown that was probably supposed to convey the fact that she meant business, but Ling had been in a similar situation many a time before – that expression meant he was close to winning.

"No. It's your cat... thing, and I don't want anything to do with it. You either take my deal and go, or stay and suffer the consequences."

"... Fine. You'd better remember, though." Good, she could tell when she'd lost. Rather, she could _today_; he was lucky she didn't try to keep going. She left in a huff, closing the door on her way out.

"... Am I ever glad I don't have to deal with _her_ anymore." Right. Skype. Other annoying sibling.

"Yeah, well, only a month or so 'til you get back, and then she'll be coming at you full force to make up for all that missed time."

"... Damn, didn't think about that..."

"Not surprising, considering how that would involve actual _thinking_."

A sharp laugh came from the speakers. "Whoa, hey, no need to be so harsh to your _older_ brother. You middle children sure are something."

Greed tended to be infuriating by nature; he didn't even need to try (though it was always worse when he did). Over the many years of constant exposure, Ling had developed an immunity of sorts to his twin's obnoxiousness – something many wished they could boast of. Even so, it was still very hard to ignore the 'older' comment (those were four minutes and eighteen seconds he'd_ never_ be allowed to forget). "Yeah, yeah. So you'll be home when, December twentieth?"

"Yeah, just in time for the big family Christmas party. What a joy that'll be..." Every year, the extended family got together for one massive reunion-type deal at Christmas – which, if not for the presence of their uncle (who was to always be addressed as Father, due to his position at the head of the 'Family'), would be like any other party. However, because he was never _not_ there, the atmosphere was always tense and harsh. Even Envy tended to mostly behave himself sometimes.

"Yup. Tons of fun to be had." Ling now looked at his desk, sighing at his science homework. They were starting optics, which meant physics, which meant too much work. Mei _did_ mention that there were cookies downstairs, and what kind of a person would he be if he let perfectly edible, _fresh_ cookies sit there with no one to eat them?

"Whoa, hey, it's getting pretty late here. I should probably go to sleep, or I'll be falling asleep in class. Which I can't do without you here. Anyway, bye."

"Alright, talk to you later." There were the telltale beeping sounds, and the call ended. He stared at his homework.

It could wait. Cookies, however, couldn't.

* * *

Ichigo paused three feet from the door in front of him. His hand was still raised in a prime doorbell-pressing position, but it wouldn't move forward. He glanced at his watch – he was fifteen minutes early. Hadn't he been ten minutes early the last time? What was going on with him?

He lowered his hand from the door and shifted his feet left and right. The more time he spend standing there, the more stupid he felt; not just because he looked like an idiot deciding whether or not to ring a doorbell, but because it was an entirely stupid thing to do since he came to this door three times a week. At first, coming here had been one of the more disgusting experiences of his life. Lately he'd gotten used to it, though. Or, he thought he had.

He dug his hands into the pockets of his jacket and glared at the door (to represent his mental glare towards himself). A moment later he raised one hand again, telling himself that he was not taking a deep breath while he did so. At that exact moment, Ichigo froze again as the door swung open.

Brown eyes met blue as Ichigo stared into the face of the house's teal-haired resident. He seemed taller today...

"The fuck you doin' here, Strawberry?"

Ichigo blinked out of his shock and put his knocking hand back firmly in his pocket. His trademark frown sitting once again upon his face, he felt that a small semblance of his comfort zone had returned, and he could answer the question.

"The impossible," he said, producing from his small messenger bag a grade eleven math textbook he'd borrowed from the library a few weeks back. "Tutoring."

Grimmjow let out a sigh of annoyance, and leaned his shoulder on the doorframe. "Didn't we do that a couple days ago?"

"Yes, and we're doing it today too. It's called a schedule," he answered, replacing the book quickly into his bag. Looking up was when he suddenly noticed what the older teen was wearing (or more accurately, what he wasn't). Sweat pants – dark green and untied – were riding low on his waist and were also the only clothing on his person. Now, Ichigo had been tutoring him since September, but he could safely say that he'd never seen quite so much of his schoolmate.

"Are you coming in?" Grimmjow asked him suddenly.

Ichigo's vision jumped from somewhere in the middle of the teal-haired teen's abdomen to his face, and then to the open doorway in front of him. He didn't answer, just shuffled forward quickly and began willing the pink tint in his cheeks to disappear.

The house, at least, didn't seem to have changed as Ichigo's attitude toward it had. He'd gone there enough to quickly know his way to the kitchen holding the large round table that had long been the location of learning. He took a seat, kept his head down, and tried to focus on quadratics. By the time he had his assortment of pencils, erasers, rulers, pens (in three different colours), lined and graphed paper all neatly arranged in front of him, Grimmjow was sitting – as always – in the seat to his left, one bare foot sitting on the table top while he pulled a less-than-clean-looking white t-shirt over his head.

"Right, so like we were talking about on Wednesday, you should be able to tell nearly everything about a relation from its formula. If you can find your way around the formulas, you've basically got quadratics."

"Sounds fascinating."

Ichigo ignored the mocking tone while he shuffled around for a worksheet. "Yeah, well, it gets better when you understand it; which is what we're trying to do, so come on, let's take a look at these translations."

The other teen sighed. "It's Friday." When Ichigo gave no response other than a look, he continued. "I don't work on Fridays."

"Or any other day of the week, which is why I'm here."

"Why are you here?"

The question caught him off-guard since neither of them was usually very inquisitive, especially about each other. Still, since it was getting less and less likely that something would get done today, he answered plainly: "Extra credit."

"Riiight."

"Of course, I'm only _saying_ that to hide my true, dark and evil intentions," he answered, heavy on the sarcasm. Then he decided to make the best of the conversation and voice his own questions. "The better question is why you're here."

"I gotta have a reason to be in my house now?"

"In your house attempting to do the math that you've refused to do for the past four years? Yes, you need a reason."

Grimmjow smiled. "'Extra credit'."

He wasn't exactly sure why, but the combined effect of this response and facial expression greatly confused him. Grimmjow sometimes had that double-meaning aspect of what he said. Either that, or he was taking advantage of the fact that he _knew_ he messed with Ichigo's head. Luckily the teal-haired teen continued on in explanation without prompt.

"College."

Ichigo smiled a little and turned the sarcasm back on. "College."

"Fuck off, Strawberry," Grimmjow said, staring at him. "What grade are you in, ten or somethin'? You don't know shit."

"I know quadratics," he murmured, before a tickle in his throat led to a small coughing fit. He wiped his watery eyes off on his sleeve when he was done, and looked up to see Grimmjow laughing at him. He wanted to cut in with a comment before the other teen could make fun of him. "Don't bother," Ichigo told him, annoyed that his voice sounded all funny after the cough. "I'm always like this; my immune system just kinda hates me."

"What's that mean?" Grimmjow asked, leaning forward after laughing.

"I'm cursed to live a life of allergies in the summer, dry skin in the winter, and an inability to breathe through my nose pretty much all year. It could be worse; I could have pneumonia. Again."

"There's Kleenex in the kitchen," the other said jokingly.

"Won't help. Nothing helps. You just wait it out and then the next virus comes along. I swear, one little kid sneezes at the other end of a store and I catch something. There's no escaping it; it's just really, really..." He realized he'd been ranting, and noticed now for the first time that Grimmjow was still leaning forward in his seat. "... Unavoidable."

"Unavoidable, eh?" Grimmjow mocked. "Never heard of apples?"

Ichigo smirked playfully. "Of course. I eat one every day to try and keep my dad away."

"Does it work?"

"So far, no. I just really like apples."

"I like strawberries."

Ichigo blinked. Was he supposed to get something from that? Was there something in that to get? He felt a little disappointed if he wasn't meant to get something from that...

So what the hell did _that_ mean?

"Strawberries," he echoed.

Grimmjow nodded. "They taste good." Ichigo nodded in agreement. "And they help with math."

Another double take. "Help... like encouragement?"

"Among other things."

"Alright," Ichigo said in frustration. "What the hell are you getting at here?"

"The strawberry," Grimmjow replied, enjoying the knowledge that he was the source of Ichigo's confusion.

Ichigo felt his cheeks grow hot and realized that he was sitting on the edge of his seat, torso angled downward just as Grimmjow's was. He swallowed.

"Strawberry... I never really understood that nickname."

Grimmjow seemed to be getting closer with every passing moment. Whether that was because of his movement or Ichigo's own, he couldn't tell. Presently he couldn't actually break away from the blue-eyed gaze of the teen.

"Makes sense to me." He said, and his eyes narrowed ever so slightly. Further indication that there were things going on in his mind that Ichigo was sure he'd never fully understand.

"Yeah, well, you don't really make sense either."

Grimmjow smiled. "Touché."

It seemed that Ichigo had been a little _too_ entranced by blue eyes and a slowly deepening voice to notice just how much closer he and Grimmjow were getting. Really, he maybe (probably) should have seen that kiss coming, but all such thoughts left his mind as he slowly start to melt. A hand in his hair pulled him closer, and he grabbed the shirt of the other teen just in time to pull Grimmjow on top of him as they fell to the ground – any pain they might have felt from this was ignored thanks to their raging hormones.

They only took breaks for air when it was crucial, and even then the breaks lasted for bare seconds each. Ichigo could feel a hand slipping under his shirt, rough and warm. It was then that Grimmjow disentangled their tongues, pulling back and looking into Ichigo's eyes.

"Stay the night."

It wasn't quite a question but it wasn't quite anything else, and despite Ichigo's sudden nervousness he found himself pulling Grimmjow back down to resume the contact between their mouths.

He couldn't ignore it, though; he _was_ nervous. This time he completely understood what it was Grimmjow meant, and they'd never gone anywhere close to… _that_. The blue-haired teen's hand was freely roaming Ichigo's chest now, and it seemed too late to back out now – not that he would want to.

The transition to someplace more comfortable was in order.

* * *

**AND THEN THEY HAD SEX.**

**So there you have it, the end of the elusive Chapter 5 that we hope at least some of you were waiting for! I'd love to make a promise about Chapter 5.5, but let's face it, this was supposed to be up in FEBRUARY.**

**Anyways, I'll just say that we both hope very much that you enjoyed the chapter and we appreciate every one of you readers (we don't even notice that there aren't many of you because you each have the awesomeness of ten readers!).**

**Please review!**


	5. Hard to Do

**Welcome to Chapter 5.5 (we hope it marks the end of funnily numbered chapters). Just as an aside, we've officially given up on regularity in posting this. It'll happen when it happens, but it WILL happen. Eventually. As in previous chapters, italics is foreign language. In this case, some more German. Don't be scared.**

**Own Tales of Symphonia, Bleach, Naruto, Full Metal Alchemist, Fruits Basket, Facebook, and Kinder Surprise, we do not. **

**But oh, if only we did own Kinder Surprise...**

* * *

Chapter 5.5 – Hard to Do

_"It is hard to convince a high school student that he will encounter a lot of problems more difficult than those of algebra and geometry." – Edgar W. Howe_

Ichigo Kurosaki, with his father's rather unique parenting style, was used to waking up to many different things. On a good day, this meant the smells of his sister's freshly-made breakfast, and on a bad day, it was his dad using martial arts to physically replace his alarm clock. _Today_, it meant finding another person sleeping next to him on a bed that he was very certain was not his own. Although Ichigo was a fiery fifteen-year-old bursting with hormones, he was proud to say this had never happened to him before. He'd never even had sex before… though with the memories of last night quickly coming back to him, Ichigo realized he'd have to rethink that last statement.

Before his mind could think through the bizarre situation any further, the teal-haired teen next to him started to stir.

"… Good morning," Ichigo said lamely after failing to come up with anything else. Grimmjow opened his eyes then, looking over the person sitting next to him with mild curiosity. The orange-haired fifteen-year-old fidgeted a little under the scrutiny, not that there was much point in that. After all, it wasn't like there was any part of him that Grimmjow hadn't seen already.

"We had sex," Ichigo said after a while. He hadn't meant to be so blunt but the other teen's silence was getting to him.

Grimmjow frowned, sitting up and leaning comfortably against the headboard of his bed. "Yeah, what's your point?"

"That pretty much was the point."

He scoffed, crossing his arms behind his head. "Not a very good one."

"Don't we… y'know, hate each other?" Ichigo asked, partially to himself as his mind tried to piece together the situation. He'd always been unsure of his semi-relationship with Grimmjow, but now… now he really had no idea. In school it was easy – everyone hated Grimmjow, it was sort of a given, but as soon as they were alone everything Ichigo thought he knew about him pretty much went out of the window. Apparently, it went into the bed.

Grimmjow opened both eyes then, officially giving up on sleep while he thought. "I dunno."

"That's stupid."

The other, being Grimmjow, immediately took offense. "Fuck off, Strawberry."

"No, I mean _this_ is stupid," Ichigo tried to explain. He stared at the other; his eyes were half open, staring off into space but even now surrounded by a rough, tired-looking frown. His jaw was set in the firm upturn of comfort, while his hair, significantly messier than the night before, was sticking out at every possible angle. The room was lit by whatever light managed to get past Grimmjow's dark drapes, making everything hard to see and at the same time bathed everything with the weird light of morning. "Clearly we don't hate each other."

Now the teal-haired teen looked at him, but said nothing. The silence continued for a long while before he asked, "So what now?"

A very good question, Ichigo thought, and it took him a moment before he stumbled through his answer. "Now we do… this."

"Again?"

"Not right away!" he snapped. "I meant we do this, the relationship thing."

"Relationship, eh?" Grimmjow said as though he didn't like the feel of the word in his mouth. "You ever done that before?"

"Well, no," Ichigo answered, wondering if it was the right thing to say. "Have you?"

Grimmjow blinked and lay back down again. "… Nah, not really."

"Are you lying?"

"Yeah."

There was more silence then, interrupted only by the sounds of late morning activity coming from the street. Eventually Ichigo caved to the atmosphere of relaxation and lay back down again.

"It ain't like anyone else needs to know anyways," Grimmjow said from beside him. "None of their damn business."

Ichigo nodded. "Yeah." He was glad that Grimmjow had said it, because it meant that he was thinking the same thing Ichigo was. Lying there in Grimmjow's bed, it was easy to think that they were fine with whatever relationship they'd stumbled into during the night's activities, but the real test came on Monday. With that heavy burden lingering in his mind, suddenly even the next two days of weekend looked less promising to Ichigo. Even now, though he had no idea as to the actual time (Grimmjow of course kept no clock in his room), he was sure that what he should really be doing was calling his dad. Just the thought of that sounded tiring, so the orange-haired teen stretched a little and put his arms behind his head, staring at the ceiling. His _dad_…

"Y'know, I know what I said before, but it _is_ Saturday." He turned to look at the other. "There's really no reason why we _can't_ do it again."

* * *

"So you haven't made any plans at all, then?"

Envy shrugged, falling backwards to lean against a locker.

"Not really. I don't know what I'm going to do. I mean, I guess me and the gang might do something later, maybe hit the town in the van or something, find some baking powder, y'know. But nothing solid."

"I assume that by 'baking' powder you mean-"

"Powder from which you get baked, yes."

"Sounds great, I suppose. So you don't have anything planned with Ed?"

Envy narrowed his eyes just the littlest bit. _Ed._

"I don't really think that's any of your business, Strawberry," he said, a frown setting into his features. "Shouldn't you be getting to class or something?"

"Actually, I was hoping to talk with Ed about some... stuff." was the answer, cool and collected. "No need to get all upset."

"Who said I was?"

"Look, we're all worried about him. I get that it's frustrating but if you're going to pretend you don't care at least do it while waiting in front of someone else's locker."

Purple eyes flashed to the panel of metal between them both. Ed's locker. It was more habit than anything else to come here in the morning; to come here and wait to see the little blond head shuffling down the hall toward him. It didn't feel right to be anywhere else.

"... Touché," Envy said reluctantly. "It's not that I don't... care," he continued, fiddling with his fingers, taking the time to crack all ten of the long and nimble digits while he tried to speak. "Things are just sort of... complicated right now."

"I know how you feel," Ichigo mumbled.

"Huh?" He looked up, but was distracted when he saw his familiar troupe heading down the hall. He gave a nod in their direction. "Hey."

"Hey," Ikkaku returned. Next to him Grimmjow just nodded; he seemed distracted by something.

"So," the bald teen continued, "we goin' out tonight? Or you gonna be uh," here he waggled his eyebrows suggestively, "busy?"

Envy's eyes further narrowed at this, but he appreciated the sentiment nevertheless. The gang weren't the type of people who would wish him a happy birthday, so this was their way of telling him they remembered.

"Don't really know yet," he answered. Ikkaku nodded and the two of them looked to Grimmjow. The taller male looked as though he was trying to very casually inspect all of the different tiles on the floor while shifting his feet every couple of seconds. He hadn't been listening to the previous conversation. Ikakku nudged him in the arm.

"What?" was Grimmjow's (somewhat annoyed) response. Ikakku motioned toward Envy. "Oh. Yeah, whatever. See you upstairs."

"Mhm." The shortest of the bunch nodded while they shuffled off; amazingly, in the direction of the grade twelve math class. "Ah, math." Envy turned back to Ichigo. "What joy."

The fifteen-year-old didn't seem to be paying attention either, though. He was staring past Envy and down the hallway.

"Ichigo?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Hm?" was the grunted reply.

Envy scoffed. "Never mind, today seems to be the day to space out or something."

"It's Monday," Ichigo offered as the bell rang and hallway traffic started to rise. "I've gotta go."

"Ed's not here yet," Envy pointed out none too calmly.

"Maybe he's late or something," Ichigo offered, then headed off down the other end of the hall. "See ya."

"Yeah," the green-haired senior student responded, although the other was already too far away to hear him. What was he supposed to do now? Of all things, he hadn't expected for Ed to just not show up. Despite his anger and everything going on between them, it was still his birthday. He still deserved for it to be his birthday, didn't he? He thought about calling him, but it would just be awkward. Besides, it wasn't like he was desperate or anything. Ed could do whatever he wanted, right? And so could Envy. He ran through a few possibilities in his head; the mall, the movies, he could even go check out Urahara's place. After a few minutes of pondering while his eyes skimmed across the tops of hallway traffic, he just sighed and slung his bag over a shoulder before following in the gang's direction toward math.

* * *

"Yacht."

"Tomato!"

"Orange!"

"Evil."

"Lake!"

"Ecology."

Kiba frowned for a minute, thinking.

"... Yyy... ak. Yak."

"Um... Knight."

"Tower!"

"Rough."

"Help."

"Play."

He closed his eyes now, grumbling a little.

"Y... Year."

"Raffle!"

"Eggs!"

"Soccer."

"... Ruler."

"Ra-"

"One more, Shikamaru. One more _fucking_ 'y' word and I'll rip-" The brunet stopped in his tracks. He noticed now a few seconds too late that Mr. Deidara was standing above him. The other members of the little table of art class friends looked downward, focusing on their work. "I mean, uh... Ah, fuck it." He waved a hand dismissively.

"Try to focus less on little games and more on... I suppose that's meant to be art, unless you want to find yourself in detention," the teacher said, grimacing as he inspected the work.

He seemed about ready to move on (which was a great relief for Kiba) until Shikamaru got his attention from the other end of the table.

"Actually, I have a few questions about the assignment. Your instructions were to leave as much space in the clay as possible, to let the air into it and stuff."

"Yes."

"But if we leave the air in, it'll expand when they're heated in the kiln."

"Exactly."

"Mr. Deidara, they'll _explode_."

The crazed artist wandered off to another table, laughing quietly to himself. The rest of the group resumed conversation.

"Right," Tatsuki continued. "So, where were we? I said 'soccer'."

"I can't remember," Kiba answered quickly. "Let's do something else."

Orihime bounced excitedly beside him. "I know! I spy with my little-"

"No," Kiba interrupted. "I don't mean play something else. Let's just talk about something."

There was a prolonged silence. Not because of awkwardness, but because thinking took longer when your hands were with busy scratching and carving and pulling and prodding away at wet clay.

"What's there to talk about?" Rukia – who sat across the table between Shikamaru and Tatsuki – asked. She was joined by the ear to Tatsuki via a pair of headphones.

"You wanna go out with me?"

The small girl didn't look up from her clay. "Once again, Kiba: no."

"Yeah, you say that now." – a grunt of displeasure from Rukia – "...Tatsuki?"

The short-haired tomboy looked up from her art to stare at him. "Do you have to make it so completely obvious how entirely desperate you are?"

"I didn't hear a 'no' there..."

"No!"

The brunet sighed, wallowing for just a moment in the complete unfairness of his life before moving on. "I suppose there's not even any point in asking you, Orihime."

"Sorry." She smiled apologetically. "I'm taken."

Momiji piped up from the other non-Shika side of Orihime. "Don't worry Kiba, being single isn't so bad!"

"Yeah, and do you even have a friend that isn't a hot chick?"

Tatsuki piped up again, "Kiba, you're disgusting, and leave Momiji alone. Maybe if you were a little more like him you'd be able to find a date."

"Ouch, Tatsuki. You know, when a guy picks on you it means they like you – should I be getting something from this?"

"You're gonna get hit in the head if you keep going."

There was another squish- and scrape-filled silence as the group continued their work. Things were going pretty well until Kiba threw his knife down with a sigh.

"So is he grading them before or after they explode?"

* * *

"I give up!"

Lloyd threw his pencil down on the table in frustration and ran a hand through his hair. He stared down at the problem on the page. It was taunting him, he knew it was. Since when did math have to be so _complicated_?

"C'mon, Bud, it's just a logarithm problem," Zelos said, glancing over to the paper in front of Lloyd.

"Well, if it's so easy, what does x equal?"

"Two." The redhead laughed at the look Lloyd was giving him. "It's really not that hard. Look, you can use one of the logarithmic laws to simplify the left side, convert it to an exponent, simplify some more, and from there it's a piece of cake." He wrote the solution as he explained, but the look he was being given was still completely lost.

"Yeah, a piece of cake to math geniuses..." The brunet sighed and stared hopelessly at the page.

"Well, it is what I want to major in."

And just like that, an awkward silence fell between them. They hadn't really spoken about what was going to happen after high school - if anything, they were just a few notches down from actively avoiding that conversation. Now here they were, unable to avoid it anymore.

"I mean, I haven't really picked out where I want to go yet, but..."

"Applications are coming up soon, right?" Lloyd asked; all hope of stopping this conversation was long gone.

Zelos nodded. "Pretty soon, yeah."

There was a small lull in conversation before Lloyd spoke again. "So... I was kind of thinking I'd go to college next year."

"Oh yeah?"

The same question was on both their minds: Where would they be next year? The only sounds in the room were of Lloyd tapping the end of his pencil against the table repeatedly and the clock above the fridge ticking away loudly.

"You know, there are a lot of universities partnering with colleges nowadays. Why don't we look at someplace like that?"

The brunet grinned. It would be pretty perfect if they could find a good university and a good college in the same city. "Well, it's worth a shot!"

Zelos smiled back. "Definitely." Before going back to his own homework, he added, "By the way, the answer to that next question is five over seven."

He very narrowly avoided being hit over the head with a book.

* * *

Envy stared down at the box in his hands, feeling a small mixture of excited and ecstatic. With the way things had been so tense with Ed for the past few weeks, he was just happy that he could be spending his birthday with his boyfriend, who was now sitting across from him on Envy's desk chair. The present was an awesome bonus. The box itself was wrapped in plain red wrapping paper which he, without warning, began to tear at with the reckless abandon of a child under the Christmas tree.

Underneath the paper was an undecorated white box, the contents of which caused his face to light up with happiness.

"_Ed..._"

"Do you like it?" the blond asked somewhat nervously.

"No," Envy began, looking Ed in the eye, "I _love _it."

"Yeah?"

"It's _beautiful._"

The object in question was a smooth, black leather jacket from which coolness _emanated_. It was one of those presents that hit the target right on the bull's eye and made you feel like you didn't need any presents ever again.

"Glad you like it," Ed replied, sounding slightly embarrassed but at the same time clearly very pleased with himself. "Sorry, _love_ it."

Envy smiled. "Really though, there are no words that can truly capture the awesomeness that is this jacket. Totally worth the whole birthday shunning thing."

"The _what_?" It was pretty amazing how fast Ed could go from smiling to scowling.

"Well... Y'know, I just mean how you weren't really around much today."

"Why do you always have to turn things into a fight?"

And just like that, Envy's smile was gone too. "I'm not! There you go twisting things around again! I was just saying! Fuck."

A deathly quiet filled the room; it fell on the 'painfully awkward' end of the comfort level scale. After what felt like forever, Ed ended the silence.

"It's not like I didn't _want_ to be there."

"And yet there I was, on my birthday, hangin' with the gang." Not that there was really anything wrong with the guys, but he'd thought that a day with his boyfriend really wouldn't be too much to ask for. Apparently it was.

"Oh, come on, what are you, three?"

"If I want to be, yeah. It's my _birthday_, Ed. Then again, not really sure why I'm surprised, it's not like we've talked at all in the past week." While that was maybe not _technically_ true, this conversation was still the longest they'd had all week.

"Well I'm really sorry that I'm inconveniencing you. Al could be dying out there but hang on, we've gotta take a break for your birthday!"

"Here it comes. The big Al speech. But wait! Has there even been one yet? No! Because you refuse to talk about him. You just mope around all day. Fuck, Ed, would I even know if something happened to him? Would you even tell me? You couldn't let me know when he first went missing, could you? I saw that on fucking _Facebook_," Envy said, no small amount of bitterness in his tone.

"I don't want to talk about it! Why can't you just accept that?" Ed stood, pushing his chair behind himself. He glared down at Envy.

"Because, Ed, I'm your boyfriend. This is what people do in a relationship, they _talk_ to each other."

"Thank goodness we have the expert on relationships here!" The blond threw his hands in the air. "Go on, keep going. I know the routine. We need to talk more, we need to spend more time together, and then there's the big one, right?"

"Yes, Ed. I want to have sex with you. I do," Envy said with all sincerity.

"And you just can't stand it when things don't go the way you want them to."

"Really? Really? And just when have we ever done things the way I wanted? Ed doesn't want to talk, so we don't. Ed doesn't want to go out tonight, so we don't. Ed doesn't want to make out, so I just go home! Do you even _like_ me, Ed?" With this, Envy stood as well. Ed began pacing the room.

"Poor you, Envy, you're not fucking getting any. Why can't you just grow up?"

"I don't think I'm the one who needs to grow _up_," he said, with a pointed look _down_ at the blond.

"_Scheiße! Ficken Dreckskerl Fotze Hurensohn! … Arschgesicht!_"

"_Very_ mature, Kinder Surprise."

"You know what, Envy, if you're so goddamn miserable with me, then why don't you just leave?"

"Because all you have to do is talk to me!"

A near-deafening silence followed. The tension in the air was palpable as they glared at each other from across the room, both waiting for the other to speak and break the silence first. It was Envy that finally did, his tone just as angry as before but his voice quieter.

"But you won't."

"But I won't."

"And that's never going to change, is it? Heaven forbid Edward fucking Elric change his fucking mind."

"Might as well face it Envy, the hard truth - that this is me, and this is you, and this is where we are. Decide now whether or not you can handle it."

Envy gave a sardonic laugh. "Do you know how unbelievable you are? I mean, you do realize that you're the one with all of the problems here, right? You're the one with all of the issues."

"Oh, I know, Envy! You make that very clear! You just can't leave things the way they are, something's always gotta be _wrong_."

"Something _is _wrong! _We're_ wrong!"

"So why are we even trying then, if things are so irreparably _fucked_ then why are we even here?"

"To end it, Ed. 'Cause I can't take it anymore. You wanted me to decide? Then this is me, telling you to get out." He couldn't take it anymore. If Ed wasn't willing to talk to him, to make this relationship work, then he was _done_.

"Good. No more fights for the great hard done to Envy to cry about. You want me to leave then I'm gone and we're done. I don't have time for this."

"That makes two of us."

Ed grabbed his coat and left Envy's room, slamming the door behind him without once looking back. The shelves nearest the door trembled a little with the force. From a distance, Envy could hear the front door being slammed closed in a similar fashion.

He sat down on his bed.

So...

…

… That was that.

* * *

**Some things about this last scene:**

**- The German is just lots of swearing. In German. Neither of us speak German fluently (or really at all) so to those of you who do, we're sorry if we fucked up. **

**- This last part was written differently from the rest. Whereas we usually split them up and get help from eachother when we need/want it, the Edvy fight made full use of the awesomeness that is Google Docs so we actually wrote it TOGETHER. Thingbe introduced me to 'instant editing' also known as ANNOYING, and GET AWAY FROM MY TYPOS. So since this scene boldly went were no scene has gone before, we'd love to hear some feedback on it. **

**As always, we only love you if you review. I'm just joshing you, we're way too desperate to be that picky.**

**Please review.**


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